


Hold My Hand

by mltrefry



Series: Run With You [3]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon, F/M, Mystery, Rewrite, Romance, Series 4 rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-07-21 14:40:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 36
Words: 226,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7391251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mltrefry/pseuds/mltrefry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>S4 "Run with You" Sequel. Better with two, but magnificent as three, or four, or more. And after five years of it being just them, the Doctor and Rose welcome back Donna Noble with open arms. But as good as Donna is for them, there's something about Rose's urge to protect her as well as the Time Lord that unsettles. And why is that stupid hand in a jar glowing more with her around?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In a little chippy in London

**Author's Note:**

> This fic I will be updating about once or twice a week, though it has been finished before hand on ff.net if you're impatient.   
> And I will start with the first three chapters uploaded at once

Sitting in a chippy in 2008 London, Rose munched on the first chips she's had from the city in nearly five years. She'd had plenty of chips over that time, but she and the Doctor had avoided the city she was born and raised in. As she munched on the hot, crispy morsel of deep fried potato goodness, she started to reason that maybe they'd stayed away too long. Aside from doing her favorite treat the best in the known (to her) Universe, she may have been a bit too paranoid about who she'd see while they'd be there.

She kept looking for a sign of recognition, of fear or anger in the faces of those she encountered but they all saw through her. Some offered nervous or polite smiles, and she knew the former was because she'd been staring.

Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to relax.

"How're you doing?" The Doctor asked, his brainy specs on despite not actually needing them to read the paper in his hands.

"'M fine," Rose admitted before popping another chip in her mouth. The Doctor's hand brushed over her skin, sending her love and comfort, and she saw the relieved smile on his face as he realized she wasn't just trying to be tough.

"How're your chips?" He asked, a knowing smirk taking over his expression.

"Bloody brilliant." She said, and he chuckled before pulling his hand away and turning the page.

The action combined with the strong flavor of salt and vinegar on her tongue caught Rose off guard. Suddenly it was six years ago, just after she'd lost her mother, a short time after they met Donna, and discovered the changes that would slowly take over her body, mind, and life span. It was also the first time she got any hint of what was to come when she had stared at the ugly mug that was Harold Saxon, aka the Master, and her heart began to hammer. This newspaper simply complained to her about maintenance on the tube, but it still sent her mind to a bad place.

"Last time this sorta thing happened," She said, moving her hand in a circle to gesture around their small, two person table. "Turned out to be hell."

The Doctor arched his brow as he glanced up at her, and maybe because he knew what she was referring to, he bent the pages of the newspaper around before folding it over to showcase what he'd been reading. "The fat just walks away." She read out loud, looking up at him and grinning cheekily. "You don't have any fat to begin with. I know, I've checked."

"Cheeky thing," he called her out as he took back the paper. "But they're making headlines because millions of people are dropping a kilo or two a day with no side affects, no exercise, no changes." He listed, taking off his specs and tucking them inside his blazer pocket.

"Sounds lovely," Rose mused, knowing full well her mother would have been the first one to sign up. It made her smile.

"Sounds suspicious," He smiled too. "Kinda like maybe we should check it out?" He suggest with a twitch of his eyebrows.

Rose wanted to tease him, she really did. She knew deep down somehow that they had just finished dealing with some sort of alien takeover, and normally they would want a break but considering neither of them could recall everything that happened she didn't see the harm.

"Fine," She said before looking at him sternly. "But I'm tellin' you right now, you're asking for trouble if you want me to play client."

"Nah," The Doctor assured, "I think I have a far better idea than that." He added as he reached across the table, his fingers caressing hers as the image of her in a gray suit while wearing the brainy specks she once used as a disguise came through. Words like 'inside job' and 'health and safety' came through, but she was already forming her own idea. Maybe he saw it, maybe he didn't, but she knew between the two of them their plans weren't terrible.

"Could work." She agreed with a smile. "Think maybe you just want an excuse for me to wear those glasses again." She called him out, and before he could pull his hand away she caught the less than innocent images that circled in the forefront of his mind while he tried his best to look like he hadn't been thinking them at all.

"Doesn't hurt," He at least admitted, probably knowing he wasn't fast enough. "So whaddya say, Shiver? Shall we investigate?" He asked.

"I think we shall, Shake." She replied, clicking the 'k' and making him chuckle in his throat. "After chips."

"Oh of course, after chips." He said, leaning back after stealing one of hers. "So I noticed you thought of something else. You wanna split up on this?"

"Better with two," She reminded him. "And better that we'd be going in from two different angles. They're hiring, seen it on the back page. I'll just use some psychic paper and make my resume so fantastic it would be impossible for them not to hire me."

The Doctor picked up the paper, flipping it to the back. "They're hiring for sales." He said as she scrunched his face.

"Yeah, and what do I have experience in?" She questioned, making his frown deepen. She snorted. "I'd not only have access to a client list but I'd be giving product information as part of training."

"Suppose," The Doctor said, suddenly seeming like he honestly couldn't think of a reason to reject her idea. "It's actually pretty solid."

"Alright then, back to the TARDIS in a bit. Gotta make myself look all professional if I'm gonna want them to hire me on spot."

The Doctor smirked, and after five years Rose knew exactly what that particular one, with the slightly hooded eyes and the tilt of his head, meant. "Need help in the shower."

"Maybe if you stop stealing my chips," She countered, pulling the basket back and grinning as his disgruntled expression.


	2. Partners in Crime pt 1

Donna Noble kind of had a crappy year. No, crappy was the polite way to put it when someone asked, though they never did. And that was if you included that period just before the new year when she was supposed to have gotten married but watched her fiance betray her then get eaten by a giant spider thing. In all fairness, that my not have been in her control but everything that followed was. She had been made an offer to travel with Martian Man and Rose, to see the stars and far off worlds, but she let a little thing like fear get in her way. And from there it only got worse.

Because even just a short time with the Doctor had seeded in her a sense of wanderlust she'd never had before.

With what money she could scrap together by selling Lance's stuff (which, in her mind, was part hers), subletting their apartment, and what she had from her employment at HC Clements, Donna traveled. She planned to see the whole world only to discover that even attempting things barefoot would cost her the legs she'd need to walk, as well as her arms and a few other body parts. But she did Egypt, sorta. The travel guide version. It was hot and uncomfortable, and full of rules, but she did it.

And then she came back to London. What was only supposed to be a couple weeks stay at her Mum's place turned out to be, well, so much longer. Her Dad passed away in that time, suddenly and early on in her supposed short stay. Heart attack. Under too much stress, though Donna wasn't sure where it stemmed. After that, her Granddad moved in and it was about the only good thing that happened since. She couldn't hold a job, one of the many downfalls her mother pointed out, had to sell her car for some extra cash, and simply couldn't get her head out of the clouds. Or, rather, her mind off the stars.

A hobby of Donna's was investigating strange reports around the London area. Anything that could have remotely linked itself to the Doctor, well, she went poking around. She even went to visit the Canary Wharf Memorial on the anniversary of the event she didn't remember and waited. She couldn't remember if Rose had said her last name, so she sat on a bench a great enough distance away to see everyone coming and going, hoping to glimpse the young woman.

But nothing turned up the Doctor.

And that's what had lead her to Adipose Industries that morning. Because honestly, from the moment she read about it in the paper she simply didn't believe a word of it. Not a thing. And Doctor or no Doctor her curious mind wanted answers like it never had before. Using her essentially useless health and safety badge (careful to cover that the probation date had passed), she infiltrated the premises and managed to get not one, but two copies of their client list and swiped a gold capsule thing that kinda looked like a pill that the company was giving away.

She used her stolen client list and tracked down a young woman who was having great success with the diet plan, and asked her a few questions.

Donna had to admit, right before the woman disappeared into nothing, leaving only a pile of clothes on the loo floor while a small, pudgy, white thing waved to her before jumping out the window, that maybe the pills worked. Well, they did, she supposed, but the little white thing tipped her off that there was a lot more going on. Something, perhaps, alien. And so help her, the Doctor  _had_  to be investigating this.

But regardless of her snooping, her investigating, the feeling of accomplishment, twenty-minutes in her mother's presence while sipping a mug of tea was all it took to make her feel like nothing. Unimportant. A waste of air.

So before her mother could damage her psyche to the point where it would be feasible that the Doctor wouldn't want her around anyway, Donna went up the hill to see her Granddad.

"Aye, aye, here comes trouble." He greeted her as he hobbled toward his telescope.

"Permission to board ship, sir?" She asked with a salute and a smile, games from her childhood coming to mind at such a simple question.

"Permission granted," Granddad said, and Donna came up closer to him. "Was she nagging you?" He asked, the gleam in his eye saying he already knew the answer. Probably got a fair bit of nagging himself before coming up the hill.

"Big time," Donna laughed as Granddad plopped down in a collapsible folding chair. "Brought you a thermos," She said as she handed the container of tea to him.

"Oh, ta," he said as he took it from her, unscrewing the cap and pouring himself a cup.

"You seen anything?" She asked, hoping for a story of a strange thing in the sky.

"Yeah. I've got Venus. Here, come and see." He beckons before pulling out another chair for her to hit more comfortably. Donna helped right it before plunking down, leaning into the the telescope so she wouldn't move it away from how Granddad positioned it. "That's the only planet in the Solar System named after a woman."

"Good for her," Donna mused. "How far away is it?"

"Oh, it's about twenty-six million miles." He replied as if letting her know the drive time to the nearest newspaper stand. "But we'll get there, one day. In a hundred years time we'll be striding out amongst the stars. Jiggling about with all them aliens. Just you wait."

"Don't suppose you've seen a little blue box?" She asked, staring up at the stars sans telescope. Hoping. Dreaming.

"Is that slang for something?" Granddad asked, and Donna gave him a chuckle.

"No, I mean it. If you ever see a little blue box flying up there in the sky, you shout for me Gramps. Oh, just you shout." She said with reverence, remembering her brief time with that alien and his sweet human girl.

"You're not yourself, Sweetheart." He said softly, kindly, saying the words Donna knew her mother was trying to say. "You just … you seem to be drifting."

"I'm not drifting," Donna said resolutely. "I'm waiting."

"What for?"

"Magic. Magic, and stardust, and love."

"Oh, ho, ho same old story. A man," Her Granddad teased her with a chuckle.

"No, not like that. It is a certain man, yes, but he's already given his heart away. And I don't care about that, because if I find him." She paused, taking a deep breath, amending herself. " _When_  I find him he'll give me what no other man ever could, a life worth living." She searched the stars, found the brightest one she knew not to be Venus, and wished. It was a childish notion, but in many ways she was chasing a childish dream, a fairy tale. So Donna Noble wished and prayed for a sign, a sighting, anything that would lead her back on that beautiful ship with her Captain and his companion.

As if it had heard her heart and could only ever grant one wish, the star blinked out of sight.

At least that's what Donna hoped had happened.

* * *

 

Nearly a decade after she began traveling with the Doctor, Rose was getting a glimpse of what her life could have been like of he never came back. Kinda. She'd had to have jobs throughout the years while she was with him as they went undercover or were stranded, but this was London her time. Three years after the calender date they met, and she was in a call center selling stuff to people over the phone.

The daily grind of the some-what domestic routine is what put the thought in her mind by day two. The Doctor would wake her up, gently kissing her jaw and whispering in her ear until she stirred, then she'd go about getting ready for work. Work. A job. She'd leave the TARDIS while shouting that she was heading out, her partner somewhere in the bowels of the ship shouting back that he'd see her after. She'd land the ship, walk by the same blue car that always seemed to be parked in the alley she'd chosen as their landing spot, and off she'd go. The conversations with customers were mind-numbingly repetitive, and at the end of her shift she'd take what information on the company she was able to leave with (educational purposes, to be better sell), grab some fish and chips, and then go home.

She was entirely thankful that he came back the second time and she'd left everything behind, even if there were days and times she would never have recognized the woman she became.

"Good morning," She started her next call. "I'm Rose, and I represent Adipose Industries. Oh good, you've heard of us." She said, trying hard to mask her disdain at the excitement on the other end.

"Sign me up, sign me up right now!" The over eager, older sounding woman said on the other end as a shadow fell over her cubicle.

The presence was distinct, electrifying, sending the hairs on her arm on end as every nerve in her sensed her Time Lord standing close by.

"Well okay, Beverley, I'll just need your credit card information, and in three weeks you'll get your first three weeks of pills." Rose said as The Doctor sat in the chair beside her.

"John Smith, health and safety," He said, likely for the benefit of anyone listening, and flashed her the psychic paper.

_Something definitely off here. Also, my memory of those glasses was not nearly as accurate as it should've been._

She met his eye, and he smirked while giving her a once over.

Rose rolled her eyes as she attuned her whole brain to her conversation with Beverly. An advantage of her unlocked Bad Wolf skills was that large, computer like brain of hers. Not like a Time Lord's, the Doctor had explained. She could only think of three things at once before getting a headache, and while making calculations was child's play, too many possibilities would send her mind in a spiral until she retreated into it and sorted it all out.

But for things like this, listening to two people at once, it was fantastic.

"Yes, you'll be billed forty-five pounds in a week."

"Are there any free gifts? Pens? Tote bags?" Beverley asked.

"Well, not those. You get an 18 carat gold Adipose Industries pendent." Rose said as cheerfully as possible, tapping her finger against her desk and indicating to the Doctor what she was talking about. He picked it up, looking it over.

"Oh, no tote bag?" Beverly said, sounding disappointed.

"18 carat gold, mate." Rose replied. "You could always sell it for the metal and probably get enough to cover three months of your pills."

"Oh," Beverly said. "Never thought of that."

"Rose," The Doctor said, and while she didn't turn to look at him while she finished up with good ol' Beverly, he continued. "Can you print us off the client list?"

She brought it up on another screen, flawlessly going between her collection of information from her over eager client and getting the Doctor what he needed.

"Where's the printer?" He asked her.

She muted her mic. "By the plant." She pointed, and he popped his head up.

"Brilliant," He said. "Paper?"

"One would hope," She replied before she ended her call.

"Excuse me, everyone, if I could have your attention." Miss Foster, the CEO, called over the room, and Rose rolled her eyes and got to her feet. Glancing down, she noticed the Doctor crouching lower, and furrowed her brow but didn't ask. "On average, you're each selling forty Adipose packs per day. It's not enough. I want one hundred sales per person per day. And if not, you'll be replaced. 'Cause if there's anyone good at trimming the fat, it's me. Now, back to it."

Rose sat down as the up tight blonde left the room with her lackeys in tow.

"And you were hiding, because?" Rose asked the Doctor.

"She was running the media conference I sorta snuck in to. The things she said, the name of the company," he shook his head. "Tell you about it at the end of the day." He said, bolting up and likely heading to the printer. Rose sighed, shook her head, and was about to close the client list when he popped back in her cubicle, leaning against the wall. "Funny thing," He said, rubbing his eyebrow before pulling on his ear. "Got to the printer, and…."

"Waited too long, someone took your list." She smirked, hitting print instead of close. "Best hope it wasn't anyone who would find that suspicious." She smiled up at him with her tongue between her teeth.

He chuckled in his throat. "Oh, are you going to punish me later?" He asked casually.

"Oh I can think of dozens of ways of punishing you, but none that you'd like," She quipped back, and he looked genuinely hurt before he winked and turned away. She vaguely heard him say hi to someone before he disappeared, and she peeked over her cubicle wall to make sure he got his papers this time. The view of him walking away wasn't too bad, either.

"Seriously?" She heard the woman from the next cubicle over growl. Clare, or Karen, or something. "You're married. Can you not flirt with the hot, available men?"

"Who said he's available." Rose replied, paying her cubicle neighbor no more attention and returned to her work.

* * *

 

When she arrived back to the TARDIS at the end of the day, she heard the Doctor talking to himself, trailing off just as the door opened. His ears turned red, "I kinda forgot you weren't here." He admitted as she shut the door behind her.

"So just talking to the TARDIS then?" She said as the ship hummed happily for being recognized.

"More myself." He admitted, rubbing his face as Rose carried their takeaway up the ramp and toward the jumpseat. She plopped down, and he sat next to her, putting his feet up on the edge of the console and dropping an arm around her. "I was just noticing that those capsule are actually a bio-flip digital switch, specifically for the aid in Adipose reproduction."

"Sorry, what?" Rose asked, looking up at him.

He smiled fondly, dropping his feet and picking up each of her legs. After removing each of her shoes and dropping them carelessly on to the grating before taking one foot and kneading it. Rose's eyes rolled back in her head, and he chuckled in his throat.

"Adipose reproduction." He started explaining. "To my understanding they have a nursery planet which is sixty-four percent lipids. Each family has a designated zone, and those zones are seeded with, well, seeds made up from the genetics of the parents." He paused, switching feet. "I'm rusty on how they limit or increase the rate of reproduction, but essentially they use bio-flip switches a lot like the ones you lot are giving away with those pills. Which makes me wonder if maybe the human race isn't being used to seed new Adipose."

"Mmm." Rose hummed in agreement, enjoying the way his cool fingers found spots in her feet she didn't know were needing a rub.

"Have you been listening?" He asked with joy and a bit of cockiness in his voice.

"Seeding fat for babies, pendent looks like a switch. Got the gist." Rose replied. "If you hadn't been working miracles on my feet I'd have listened better."

"One can't help knowing all the pleasure centers in the human foot when one's mate is, in fact, a human. Besides, isn't this what husbands do for their wives after a long day of work?"

"Not my husband," She teased, grinning as she knew the affronted look he'd have without even seeing it.

"Oi, we're close enough. Sorta bonded, ring on your finger for five years."

"No ring on your finger." She countered.

"Not a Time Lord thing," He retorted. "And I did say I'd ask you in the next decade. Only been five years."

"Only. Hate to say this, Doctor, but if even Jack is starting to doubt you'll actually come around."

His lips pressed to hers, which Rose realized a moment too soon that it involved his adjusting his position to be half on top of her. "I promised," He murmured against his lips. "I wouldn't do that lightly. Just want everything to be perfect when it happens."

"Never gonna be your perfect Rose again, me." She said softly, opening her eyes to see his warm, loving brown ones locked on her gaze. "Done too much, have had too little redemption."

"You've never done anything that wasn't necessary," he said, quiet but firm. "My life in danger is your life in danger, which means it's all been self preservation."

"So how do you explain that week you could barely look at me?" She challenged.

The Doctor stood, rubbing his hand along his face. "It wasn't what I would have done. I didn't see the threat like you did, and, well, as I've said before, I couldn't look at you for a week because I realized I could have risked your life. You were there, dead in my arms for a couple minutes, and all I could think was how close I could have been to a to be the one to take that blast, and we aren't entirely sure what will happen if I regenerate. Time was I could be reckless and know you'd be alright, but now …."

"Oh, yes, of course, blame me for your being a little more cautious of your life." She growled, because this was how the argument always went.

The Doctor sighed. "Not tonight, please, please not tonight. It's been four days of not seeing you all that much and I don't want us to get into another spat where you go drinking on some planet with Jack which results in two months of what ever it is you two do."

Rose took a breath, closed her eyes, and focused.

She was not a bad person. She doesn't take life lightly. He was not placing blame, she knew that. They'd talked about this, and Bad Wolf was more blessing then curse. She was not the same as she was when they met, but then again neither was he and in more than just the obvious ways.

He cupped her cheek, defenses down. Love, concern, reassurance, regret, it flowed freely into her as his forehead touched hers.

"You will always be my perfect Rose." He said softly. "No matter how many thorns you think you have." She snorted, and the joy the pull of her lips had on him crashed over her. "I'm going to head to a couple of the clients' homes, pose as a door to door interview for the company. I could always use a gorgeous assistant."

"And what does this assistant do, exactly?" She asked, opening her eyes to see the argument had left his entirely.

"Take notes, notice the things I don't, generally show me up about fifty percent of the time. The usual."

"Alright, think I can manage that. After tea, I'm starved."

* * *

 

It was the address closest to the TARDIS, so the walk was only about a half hour tops. She'd changed to flats, because no matter how comfortable those glorious, unearthly heels were there was no way she'd risk twisting her ankle in them.

Pulling the psychic paper from his pocket as they approached the door, the Doctor dropped her hand after sending one last little beat of affection. He knocked, and Rose straightened her blazer as they waited.

A thin enough man in his mid thirties opened the door, looking between the two of them, eyes lingering on her just a little longer.

"Hello, Mister Roger Davey, we're stopping by on behalf of Adipose Industries to ask you a few follow-up questions." The Doctor greeted with a smile, flashing the psychic paper which Roger glanced at briefly.

"Oh, yeah, sure, come in, come in." He said, stepping aside and letting them into his small, nice town house. He gestured for them to take a seat on the sofa, which both complied as Roger sat in the armchair. "Was a little pudgy after the divorce, absolutely had to find a way to shed it because nothing else was working." He said, still glancing at Rose fleetingly. "I've been on the pills two weeks, now. I've lost fourteen kilos." He said with a touch of pride.

"Blimey that's quite the drop in that amount of time." Rose said, looking him over. "Can't really need to lose that much more."

"Well, my goal was twenty kilos so I'll still use them for another six days to get there, maybe eight for a bit of a buffer." Roger replied.

"You make it sound like you're guaranteed a kilo a day." The Doctor noted.

"Hasn't wavered at all. One kilo, exactly. Wake up, and it's disappeared overnight." He said, pausing to consider. "Well, technically speaking it's gone by ten past one in the morning."

"What makes you say that?" The Doctor asked cautiously.

"That's when I get woken up by the burglar alarm. By the time I get it all shut off I figure I may as well weigh myself. "

"Burglar alarm?" Rose asked, arching her brow. "That doesn't worry you, neighborhood like this?"

"Not like it's bad," Roger reasoned.

"That's exactly it." Rose replied, standing and heading toward the kitchen, looking around for a back door. She noted one heading out to the back garden. "Grew up in the Estates me, and if we heard alarms it was no big deal. But I also know that anyone else would be a bit more concerned."

She heard Roger and the Doctor follow her in, and she turned to look inquisitively at the owner of the house.

"Well I was at first. Same time every night, driving me mad. Always just get to sleep and the alarm goes off. I've had experts in, I've had it replaced, I've even phoned Watchdog. But no, ten past one in the morning, off it goes."

"But with no burglars." The Doctor stated.

"Cat burglars maybe," Rose smirked, gesturing to the cat flap on the bottom. The Doctor knelt down, poking it with his sonic.

"It was there when I bought the house. Never bothered with it. Not a cat person."

"Well, maybe you're the type of person a cat likes?" Rose teased.

"Single and alone, sounds about right." Roger joked, putting his hands in his pockets as he rocked on the balls of his feet.

"Don't think it's cats," The Doctor said, and Rose looked down at him as he he looked up. "After all, the fat just walks away." He then stood up. "Well, thanks for your help, Roger. Tell you what, maybe you could lay off the pills for a week or so."

"You don't need'em anyway." Rose said with a wink, patting Roger on the arm and containing the giggle threatening when he blushed fiercely. She and the Doctor left Rogers house, looking up and down the street. "Where to now?" She asked.

"Well, now we should…." He stopped when something started beeping in his pocket.

Without much effort, he pulled out a palm sized device with three points and clear casing that had a bunch of lights on it. And without fully explaining, he started running.

"I'll see you at home," She called back, noting the hand in the air to state his acknowledgment before he turned a corner. "Don't get yourself killed." She grumbled to herself as she turned and started her walk back to the TARDIS.

Deep down Rose knew she should have gone with him, but she just didn't have it in her. He could have gotten hurt, or killed, or captured, and she'd have to hunt him or those who hurt him down if she was still alive, but she still let him go.

Because she was sure the last Time Lord in existence didn't always appreciate having a guard dog growl at anyone who so much as glares at him.

What must have it been like these last five years? Sure her instincts have simmered in the last couple years, and she didn't always react violently when there was perceived harm. But some part of him had to have hated how she was always right there. How emasculating must it be for him to have his mate be the one to toss around the bad guys around, or jump in and protect him from even the most minor threats. He never said anything about it, but she was sure it probably got to him on occasion. Hence why they likely started arguing earlier.

The TARDIS hummed in her mind the second she saw the blue box, a mix of comfort and chastising. 'You're not a bad person,' paired with, 'and don't you dare think otherwise.'

"Yes, yes," She mumbled as she fitted her key in the lock and turned it, giving the exterior a loving pat before stepping inside.

Rose walked up the ramp, her eyes falling on the hand in the jar under the console where the Doctor insisted they keep it, trying very hard to ignore the way it glowed gold for a second. She'd pointed it out once, but after staring at the hand for hours, the Doctor and her conceded that maybe she was seeing things. Then it happened again, here and there over the last five years, and every time she caught it she either tried ignoring it entirely or shivered involuntarily.

As much as she loved his hands, she really wish he didn't have the spare one kicking around where it could be all glowing and creepy.

Plopping down on the jumpseat, she shifted her body so she could lay back and close her eyes for a spell.

She'd no idea how long she was laying there before the doors opened, closed, and she heard him slump against them.

"I lost'em." He grumbled, and she opened her eyes to see him pulling on his hair.

"What were you doing, anyway?" She asked, sitting up and hugging her knees.

"I was using my animated lipid detector. It beeps when it's near thinking fat. In other words, it's an Adipose tracker."

She waited. "And…"

"And?" He asked as he came up the ramp, sitting on the spot she cleared for him.

"And what else does it do?"

He furrowed his brow. "It blinks a whole bunch?" And then he grinned. "I can make things that only have a single purpose, Rose."

"It's a first with me." She said, smiled with her tongue between her teeth.

"Oi," He said, getting her to giggle and he smiled brighter. "I miss that sound. You don't do it nearly as much as you used to."

"Getting better, though, yeah?" She asked.

He kissed her hairline, "Absolutely." He agreed. "So I feel as though we should move on to phase two of this mission tomorrow."

"Phase two, huh? What's phase two?" She asked, scooting to lay back on his lap. His fingers automatically moved to her hair.

"Phase two is we shut down this breeding operation that's going on. I don't know  _why_  there are Adipose being gestated on Earth, in humans, but it's got to stop. Because soon enough there will be millions of the little things running around, and that could mean trouble."

"Oh?" Rose said around a yawn.

He chuckled. "Still after all this time I forget just how human you are." He said, shifting his arms beneath her and lifting her effortlessly off his lap and down the hall to their bedroom.

Still blue walls with hardwood floors, accents of pink and blue with dark furniture, the only things that changed over the years were pictures added or changed, cosmetics cycled through, and the reading material resting on their night stands.

Rose was still awake enough to do it on her own, but she allowed the Doctor to undress her, handing her her sleep clothes while he stripped down to just his pants, and curled up in bed beside her. "You planning on sleeping too?" She asked.

He shrugged, "Planned to. Big day tomorrow, should be as well rested as possible. But if you had other activities in mind."

"Goodnight," She said in a sing-song way before giving him a kiss and curling into his side.

"Goodnight, Precious Girl." He said with reverence, long letting go the lack of day and night in the TARDIS argument and simply let things be.

* * *

 

The nightmares came as they always had. Blood spilled by her own hands, and her uncaring, unfeeling. Faceless, insignificant, in her way, they all died and she walked away from the carnage with the strut of a goddess. Because Bad Wolf was that, and even with all her glorious time power taken from the body she'd chose she was still known, still feared, still unstoppable. And no one, absolutely no one, was above her.

Not even a Time Lord.

She woke up shaking, cold, sweating, and crying. The Doctor was clutching her tight, whispering her soft, soothing words in both English and Gallifreyan. The fingers of one of his cool hands stroked her hair in short, reverent strokes while the other hand drew his alphabet on her exposed stomach.

"They're safe," He whispered. "You didn't hurt anyone, it's fine, every thing's alright."

She laughed through a sob. "Aren't you supposed to say that  _I'm_  safe?" She said sardonically.

"I could see what you were dreaming of." He admitted. "So much contact with each other, walls down from sleep, was hard not to see."

"I'm sorry," She whispered, the tears still coming rapidly though her breathing was steady.

"You've seen how often I dream of the day I …. You know what it's like for me, you don't have to apologize."

"You say that every time," She noted, running her fingers along his chest, under the sparse hair.

"Because you always feel the need to apologize." He countered, kissing her forehead and easing his grip on her. "Here for each other, Rose. Better or worse, dreams or nightmares, always."

She smiled at that, leaning back and not stopping him at all as he kissed her deeply. She didn't give pause as he gently rolled her on to her back, nor when the hum of the TARDIS slowly quieted as if she left the room. When he hovered above her, her hands went in his hair to ensure he wouldn't pull away. She nodded as best she could when she felt him tug on her bottoms.

It wasn't habitual for them to make love after one of them had a nightmare, but tonight she needed it. She needed to be grounded, to know she could still love, feel, and he knew it.

* * *

 

She went to work for the last time that day, feeling a little less rested than she'd like but she wasn't about to complain. Rose went in wearing her flats, pants that looked closer to the yoga variety than the professional kind, but made sure to wear a gorgeous sweater to detract from the dress down.

She only half heartedly took calls, and never once did she input anyone's credit card numbers. Bad enough, she realized, that these poor fools were being virtually impregnated with aliens, but now she realized that they invaders were making a profit off it. She hoped the banks were prepared to correct a few million charges.

Just as lunch rolled around, she was sent a text message. Fully expecting it be Jack, she was surprised to see a blocked number.

_Unknown: Use your super phone to track this number. Come see me when you can._

How and when did the Doctor find a cell phone?

Rose shook her head, set aside her head set, and used her phone and a handy app to track him. It paid to have a phone from the future, even if it was only a few years ahead of this one.

The tracker lead her down to the basement, and her HC Clements familiarity was creeping up on her once again as she came to a small metal door. Thankfully, no Torchwood logo. She'd have to have had a few words with the Captain if there had been.

"I know you're out there, hold on." She started at the Doctor's voice echoing with out reverberating, and the whir of the sonic following shortly. The small, metal door swung out, and he stood in the doorway looking quite proud of himself and his hiding spot.

"Seriously, broom closet?" She eased with an arched brow, crossing her arms and shifting her hips.

"Much more than a broom closet in here," He said, beckoning her in.

"Better be more than you, too." She said before heading inside as asked.

Once she was inside the small space, he closed the door and soniced the lock. She arched an eyebrow, and he twitched his before he became serious and turned to the wall behind him. He removed a panel, revealing a large machine with green back lighting.

"What is that?" Rose asked, shifting around him to have a better look.

"I think this is the computer that regulates the bio-switches. From this machine one could increase or decrease the amount of Adipose born per night. And make it so they  _would_  be born at night, the less likely to draw attention if most of London's asleep." He explained as Rose looked it over, her brain calculating everything she could see.

"Triple deadlock," She noted.

"Yep," he grumbled, popping the 'p' anyway.

"So what's your plan?" She asked, looking it over for something he might have missed.

"Probably going to wait around here until everyone leaves, take a gander at the CEO's office, see what turns up. Wanna join?"

"Could do," Rose said, straightening up, having a look up top. "But I could hack the system. Find the codes to shut this down."

"Not a bad idea." The Doctor agreed. "So I guess we'll just … wait."

"You stayin'? Not much more you can do in here." She said as she turned toward him.

"I can think of lots of things we could do in here." He said as he glanced around the space.

"When did you become so licentious?" She asked furrowing her brow and shaking her head, crossing her arms and careful not to accentuate anything.

"When did you become less so?" He asked in turn, mirroring her pose.

She grinned. "Five years, not even married, and look at us." She stuck her tongue between her teeth for a beat. "Not even in my thirties and already we seem like an old married couple. What's it gonna be like when I hit a hundred? Or Older? How long do Time Lords live?"

The Doctor considered this. "I have two regenerations left, providing I don't decide to get into some kind of mischief and you can't save me, we could have a few thousand years left." He said, moving his head back and forth.

"Well, a slight drop in normal activities isn't gonna kill ya, so pace yourself. Thousand years is a long time." She said, reaching out and fixing his tie, pointedly avoiding his affectionate gaze for fear he may feel too domesticated if he noticed. "Now, I need to eat. Shall we go out together or are you happy in your cubby?" She did glance up then, and he grinned manically before rifling through his pockets.

He pulled a brown paper bag out of his left one.

"Made you lunch, Sweetheart." He teased, handing it to her as his expression suddenly changed to thoughtful. "Oh, Sweetheart. Never called you that before."

"Yes you have," She said absently as she opened the bag to see a fancy looking sandwich, a banana, and bottle of water.

"When?" He asked, and she considered when that happened.

"Huh," She said when the fuzzy memories fluttered through her mind. "Maybe you haven't." She replied, realizing that this could be the point he starts the habit that future Doctor had.

"Oh well. Anyway. You may eat your lunch here in my cubby, or you can go back up to your cubicle and munch at your desk."

In response, Rose got down on the floor, sitting lotus style as she pulled out the sandwich and took a bite. The Doctor joined her, though neither spoke much in that time. It was nice, quiet, the calm before the storm, and Rose was grateful for the moment when she was unsure what was going to come.


	3. Partners in Crime pt 2

Rose didn't clock out at the end of her shift. She didn't leave with the rest. Knowing that it was unlikely anyone would notice her absence she went to the washroom an hour before quitting time and entered one of the stalls. Lowering the lid, she sat down and waited.

And waited.

She turned her phone on silent after checking to see if there was a message from the Doctor, though there wasn't. She checked the time, noting only a couple hours had passed.

 _Honestly,_ she thought to herself,  _have I really forgone the slow path for so long that I have this little patience?_

She sighed as quietly as she could, crossing and recrossing her legs.

Rose thinks she hears movements, and then a cell phone rings loudly.

"Not now!" A woman with a painfully familiar voice whisper yells, and a stale door closes. Rose knitted her brow, concentrating on the one side of a conversation she wasn't a part of, trying to remember when she heard this voice before.

"I can't," the voice said. "I'm busy. I'm in church. Praying." She said so sarcastically that Rose had to cover her mouth to cover the laugh.

Church.

" _Get me to the church!"_ Donna's voice echoed in Rose's memory and now she had to hold the gasp. Her heart pounded, excitement tingled, and her smile grew before she heard the washroom door slam open.

"We know you're in here, so why don't you make this nice and easy and show yourself?" Miss Foster, CEO of the alien impregnater company, said oh so sweetly that Rose rolled her eyes.

It was entirely possible that it was Donna Foster was looking for, but in case it wasn't Rose didn't hesitate to step out. Whatever Donna was doing here, knowing she didn't work for the company, Rose wanted her to try and continue with it. After all, maybe the Doctor might find her.

"Here I am," Rose said, arms out to the side as she stepped out. She took in the armed bodyguards at Miss Foster's side. "Honestly, you don't need to bother. I'll come quietly."

"Oh, you'll come quietly for now. But I assure you, Miss Tyler, that by the end of the evening you will be begging to be silenced."

"Haven't heard that before," Rose mumbled, refraining from rolling her eyes as she allowed the bodyguards to lead her out of the room.

They headed up to Foster's office a couple floors above, passing numerous empty cubicles on the way to the posh room. The large picture windows give a gorgeous view of London, as well as the cables to a window washing cart that Foster doesn't seem to notice.

"Sit there." She said, her voice soft but firm, and Rose sat in the guest chair, allowing the guard to tie her up without a fight. She looked down at the bindings and smirked. She could snap herself out of these without issue, take out both guards, guns or not, and switch the power around on Foster faster than the blonde CEO could think, alien or not.

But she wasn't like that. Rose was not violent, not when it wasn't needed, and this was not a violence required situation.

"So you're impregnating the human race with aliens." Rose said calmly.

Foster looked surprised. "Strictly speaking, I'm seeding the fat. The humans don't actually feel anything. But how did you know?"

Rose shrugged as much as she could. "Fat just walks away. Adipose industries. Anyone with basic knowledge of intergalactic species could figure it out." She said smoothly and not at all like she only found this information out the day before.

Foster smiled. "Yes, of course. But how do  _you_  know about it?" She asked, moving around behind her desk.

"Clever, me." Rose grinned. "Have a lot of experience with such things. Though I've honestly never seen an Adipose. Don't quite understand how fat becomes a living thing."

Foster grinned. "When the humans ingest the pill, it breaks down, enters the blood stream, attracts their fat and binds it together. Galvanises it to form a perfect little body." She said as she reached into a draw and pulled out a little … thing.

It was white, and roundish with little black eyes and an infectious little smile that held a single tooth. It flapped its little hands at Rose in greeting., causing her nostrils to flare as she fought to maintain calm.

"Oh my god," Rose cooed. "Oh look at you, you darling thing. Oh, you are going to be the cutest invasion that ever happened."

"We're not invading, we're procreating. Giving life. Once I have a million Adipose children the nursery ship will come and bring them home."

"Hate to say it mate, but it's still an invasion. You're attacking humans, whether you think you are or not."

"Oh, no, I'm fully aware what we are doing it so very wrong. But I have a job to do, and the word invasion…." Foster trailed off, something catching her eye and she turned to the window.

Cringing, Rose looked over, seeing the Doctor mouthing and gesturing. But not to her. She glanced to the other side, and smirked at the faces and mimes Donna started making back at him. When her eyes land on them she froze.

"Are we interrupting you?" Foster asked.

"Run," Rose yelled, and Donna disappeared.

"Get her!" Foster commanded as the window washing lift headed upward. "And him!"

"I'll warn you now." Rose said, getting Foster's attention for a moment. "Hurt her and you'll be hurt too. Touch him, you'll wish you'd never chosen Earth."

Foster smiled condescendingly down on Rose, snickering before she turned and left the room.

Rose flexed, shifting her arms.

Okay, so maybe the bindings weren't going to be that easy to snap. She attempted to stand up through them, putting her feet on the edge of the seat and wriggled her body up.

"Ah!" She yelped as the chair tipped back. Her head hit the floor, making her see stars a moment as she groaned. She'd never been so thankful to not have the Doctor around.

Swinging her feet up, she got leverage enough to right herself on the fourth swing, tensing her muscles to prepare for the landing and somehow putting enough tension on the bindings to snap them as her body landed straight up. She could feel where her arms were badly bruised, the weakness the pain caused her muscles an unpleasant sensation she was no longer used to.

Now, the question was, where was the Doctor or Donna? She thought she heard the motor of the window washing lift once again, and she closed her eyes and rubbed the bridge of her nose. Because she knew, deep in her gut, without needing to look, that the daft, stupid alien was likely inside it.

* * *

 

Donna felt cool, ballsy, like a total bad ass hiding in the washroom stall with her book and her purse full of snacks and drinks. And no, no she didn't  _have_  to be there for 9:30 am when she was only going to be waiting around all day but the look on her mother's face was totally worth it. Because it wasn't her day for the car and she took it anyway, a rebellious move Donna hadn't made in a while.

And by the time she checked the time and saw it was after six, and most people would be leaving for the day she could barely contain her excitement. She wasn't sure what she would do with the knowledge she'd get from poking around if she didn't find the Doctor, but damn it it may be something she could make money off of. Maybe sell it to a newspaper. There was a nosy reporter at that press conference yesterday, maybe she could track down Patty, or Penny, or Posey, whatever.

Creeping out her stall, ready to join a life of crime and intrigue, Donna's phone rang.

She jumped, fumbling to get the thing opened and answered, cursing as she saw who it was as she backed into her stall.

"Not now!" She whisper yelled to her mother.

"I need the car," her mother nagged. "Where are you?"

"I'm busy." Donna growled quietly.

"Why are you whispering?" Her mother nagged still.

"I'm in a church."

"What are you doing in a church?" Her mother asked incredulously.

 _Getting married to a millionaire_. Donna thought as she rolled her eyes. "Praying." She said instead, not at all masking the annoyed sarcasm. She thought she heard a soft giggle, but no, had to have been hearing things.

"Bit late for that, madam." Her mother retorted, making that soft gasp a possible figment of Donna's imagination. Her mother kept going on, but the doors to the washroom slamming off made Donna jump and hang up on her. Oh well, she was just going to keep harping anyway.

"We know you're in here, so why don't you make this nice and easy and show yourself," The disgustingly sweet sounding woman who ran the press conference the day before said, and Donna's heart raced. She pulled her feet up off the floor, making herself into a tiny ball.

Gone was cool, ballsy, and bad ass. She was scared.

"Here I am," A familiar voice said, "Honestly, you don't need to bother. I'll come quietly."

Donna's heart stopped. First because she realized she wasn't the one they were looking for, second because she suddenly remembered  _where_  she heard that voice before.

" _You'll be seeing me again."_ Rose's words from so long ago came back to Donna in a rush, and there was absolutely no mistaking who that voice was. It may have only been a few words, but it was all it took for Donna's heart to start pounding again.

"Oh, you'll come quietly for now. But I assure you, Miss Tyler, that by the end of the evening you will be begging to be silenced." The CEO's words were kind sounding, making the threat that more bone chilling.

Rose mumbled something, and Donna heard the shuffling of feet before the creek of the door.

"If she's here, so's he." She said to herself, that cool, ballsy, bad ass feeling returning. She got to her feet, shaking at first but growing more confident as she followed the CEO, Rose, and apparently two armed guards up to the offices. She watched the lift, seeing what floor that got off on, then took the stairs. Sure, she'd lose some time, but it would be worth keeping what stealth she thought she had.

Tip toeing past the empty cubicles, she carefully approached the small window in the door that allowed her a view of what was going inside the office.

It was Rose, it was so, totally Rose. She could see her clear as day and it sent a rush of excitement through her so strong she couldn't concentrate on conversation the two were having. She looked around the room hoping, praying, wishing.

And then there he was spying through the window, looking right back at her: The Doctor.

"Donna?" He mouthed, and her grin grew to a size it hadn't in about a year.

"Doctor!" She mouthed back, putting as much enthusiasm behind it as she could while keeping quiet. He seemed to stutter, and she just was too excited. "It's me!" She mouthed, pointing to herself.

"I can see that." He mouthed back, miming as well.

"Oh this is brilliant!" She continued the quiet but highly animated exchange.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"I was looking for you two!"

"What for?"

And then she explained. Well, tried to with gestures and mouthing as much as she could. Because, really, was his Martian senses so strong that he could see her that far away? She could see him, so she supposed. And so she kept telling him all that she'd done to try and find him, gesturing to Rose when she noticed they'd been caught.

And while Rose grinned, Foster lady did not.

"I'm sorry, are we interrupting you?" The likely psychopath asked, and the Doctor and Rose both yelled at her to run. Of course, only the former was audible, but that was fine because she wasn't planning on sticking around to listen.

Running full speed to the stairs, she headed up. After all, he'd have had to have been on the roof to use the lift her was on, and it was likely he wouldn't have stayed just outside the window.

She heard the flurry of feet coming toward her from above, and while she knew she should have been caution, she eagerly headed toward it.

Donna was rewarded with the Doctor. "Oh my God!" She cried out as they reached the same landing and she pulled him into her arms. He wrapped his long, thin ones around her. "I don't believe it. You've even got the same suit! Do you ever change?" She asked as she pulled back.

There were noises below, and she and the Doctor glanced down to see the guards starting to follow them.

"Should probably catch up later." He said as he gestured toward the way he came.

"What about Rose?" Donna asked as the Doctor grabbed her hand and pulled her up the stairs.

"Oh, trust me, Donna. She can take care of herself." He replied.

"But she's tied up in psycho's office." Donna countered, quite confused as to why he seemed to unconcerned with Rose's well being. She remembered he practically had her glued to his hip where possible last time, especially as he pulled her from the water pouring in from the Thames as they escaped the creature.

"We call that Tuesday." He said, flashing her a grin over his shoulder before pushing open the door to the roof. "How did you get involved with this?" He asked as he rushed toward the lift, getting out his little wand do-hickey that she recalled from the last time she saw him. "You aren't into investigative reporting now, are you?"

"No, I was just trying to find you." She admitted as they moved toward the lift. She watched him work on it with the do-hickey while carrying on her story. "I just thought, look for trouble and then he'll turn up. So I looked everywhere, you name it: UFO sightings, crop circles, sea monsters. Stuff about bees disappearing, all of it, I thought, bet he's connected."

"What do you mean? The bees are disappearing?" He asked before sticking the do-hickey in his mouth.

Donna shrugged as she watched the Doctor step into the lift.

"I don't know, that's what it said on the Internet. It was all on the same sight, including the conspiracies about this place." She said as she watched him extend a hand toward her. "What?"

"In you get." He said after taking do-hickey in his free hand.

"In that thing?" She gestured.

"Yes, in this thing." He replied.

"But if we go down in that, they'll just call us back up again." She reminded him.

"No, no, no. I've locked the controls with a sonic cage. I'm the only one who can control it. Not unless she's got a sonic device of her own, which is unlikely." He snorted. "And when we get low enough, Rose will have freed herself and she can open a window and let us in."

Realizing how unlikely it was that there was another way out of the mess that she willingly and eagerly gotten herself into just to see this man, Donna climbed in.

The Doctor pointed his do-hickey, sonic-mabob at the wheels and they slowly started to lower.

She should say something. She was so willing to talk his ear off before, but now as they slowly descended from who knew how many stories up she wasn't so chatty.

Just as she started to feel comfortable, the lift jerked before suddenly speeding up.

A sound was coming from Donna that she hadn't fully realized was a scream until she watched the Doctor point his do-hickey upward and the whole thing halted. Falling to the floor of the lift had stopped the sound, and the hammering of Donna's heart from fear and adrenaline made her ears ring.

"Hold on, we can get through the window, make our way down to Rose after." He said as he pointed his blue-light device at the window. He pointed it all around. "Can't get it opened." He growled.

Donna looked around her, finding a massive tool of some kind near by. "We'll smash it," She reasoned, grabbing the rook and standing. She took a few good swings, realizing by the third that it was probably safety glass, and it likely wasn't going to break by some small force even from the outside.

A flicker of light caught her eye, right around the same moment the Doctor looked up as well.

"She's cutting the cable," She realized allowed a second before said cable broke free.

The lift tilted. What made Donna think she'd have leverage while holding on to the broken cable she wasn't sure. But she certainly wasn't complaining when her grip on the cable prevented her from falling the rest of the way to the pavement below.

"Donna! Hold on!" The Doctor called out from above.

She swung her leg about without thought, not even able to stop them moving when she heard a a creaking that had to be the cable about to break.

"Donna, hold still." She heard Rose below her. She felt arms wrap around her just at the knees, pulling her toward the building until she felt her butt hit the edge of the open window. At that point she let go, sliding inside and landing on top of the blonde girl with an 'Oof!'

Rose cringed. "Way more pain than I was anticipating experiencing this evening." She admitted with a grin and a chuckle that Donna couldn't help return.

"I was right, it's always like this with you two, isn't it?" She asked as she clamored off Rose and helped her to her feet, feeling awful as the poor thing winced and moaned in the process.

"Oh yes," She turned to see the Doctor beaming in the door way before darting over, taking Rose into his arms and holding her tight for a not even a full second. "What's wrong? Why are you in so much pain?" He asked with a furrowed brow, looking her over while his touch became loose and delicate around her shoulders.

"Bindings a little tighter and tougher than usual." She said with a half-hearted shrug.

"You alright?" He asked, not sounding as concerned as he had before.

"Yeah, just badly bruised. Should be fine in a couple hours." She said, gently rubbing her arms. "But we need to move before Foster comes back," Rose said, and she and the Doctor headed for the door.

Donna followed after them, grinning despite everything else.

Because they were there, in front of her, doing their thing, and she was a part of it.

They hadn't gotten very far through the cubicles before Foster and her armed body guards came from the direction of the lifts, causing the trio to stop short with Donna and Rose flanking the Doctor.

"Well then," She said, taking off her glasses. "At last." She grinned sweetly.

"Nice to meet you, I'm the Doctor." He said, "You already met Rose."

"And I'm Donna."

"Partners in crime," Foster said, looking them over. "And evidently off-worlders, judging by her knowledge your sonic technology."

"Oh yes, I've still got your sonic pen," The Doctor said as he pulled the pen with a blue light from inside his jacket pocket.

"Oh that's lovely," Rose said, taking it from him and looking it over, lightly caressing it. "Very feminine, very posh. What do you think, Donna? Posh?" She asked, handing the pen back to the Doctor who held it toward Donna to examine.

It looked like a pen with a light, but an expensive pen that one would find in jewelry shops and refills that cost a fortune.

"Very posh, sleek." Donna agreed.

"And if you were to sign your real name, that would be?" The Doctor asked the psychopath in front of them.

"Matron Cofelia of the Five-Straighten Classabindi Nursery Fleet. Intergalactic Class." She said with poise and pride.

"A wet nurse, using humans as surrogates." The Doctor put it in layman's terms, and Donna kinda hoped it was for Rose's benefit as much as hers.

"I've been employed by the Adiposian First Family to foster a new generation after their breeding planet was lost." Matron something-or-other explained, and for a moment Donna's mind wandered. An entire planet to breed. What exactly happens with these … these aliens that they need an entire planet to breed fat babies?

"How do you lose an entire planet?" The Doctor asked, partially bringing Donna back to reality.

After all, she could somewhat, sorta accept the fact that these babies she's caring for or breeding, or whatever, are from fat. But when she thought of that poor woman who disappeared before her eyes.

"So the little things are made of fat, yeah?" Donna said despite the Matron and the Doctor having carried on some kind of conversation she didn't listen to. "But there was nothing left of Stacy Campbell."

"Oh, in a crisis the Adipose can convert bone and hair, and internal organs in to bodies. Makes them a little sick, poor things."

"What about poor Stacy?" Donna demanded, and the Matron snickered.

"Were you planning on doing that to everyone?" Rose demanded. "All of your millions of customers? Just going to turn them to nothing? A life for a life?"

"A life for a dozen lives." The Matron corrected in a polite but menacing way. "And it wasn't my intention to do that."

"Seeding a level five planet is against galactic law," The Doctor said, and as Donna glanced up at the two of them her body went cold. The Doctor's eyes were hard and cold like she remembered seeing at the moment he destroyed the Racnoss, while Rose's were full of rage and fire unlike anything Donna had seen before.

"Are you threatening me?" The Matron challenged, and Donna could sense the stand off forming.

"We're trying to help you, Matron. This is your one chance, 'cause if you don't call this off we'll have to stop you." The Doctor said slowly, cautiously.

"I hardly think you can stop bullets." The Matron replied, and her body guards aimed and cocked their guns at them.

Rose stepped in front of them both, a hand firmly forcing Donna back behind the Doctor while she squarely placed herself in front of him.

"Not a good idea," She half growled, and Donna was half glad she couldn't see the blonde's face.

"Oh?" Matron challenged. "Still think I should be scared of you?" She said to Rose like she was a petulant child.

"You should be very scared." Rose said, low and dangerous.

"Now, hold on, ladies." The Doctor said, placing his fingers briefly on the back of Rose's neck before reaching into his jacket pocket and pulling out his own sonic thing that wasn't a pen. "Before we let the wolf loose to the sound of gun fire, I'm curious. Matron, tell me, do you know what happens if you hold two identical sonic devices against each other?"

The Matron considered it. "No," She said.

"Nor me, let's find out!" The Doctor exclaimed, and before Donna could see what he was doing an ear-drum shattering, high pitched noise surrounded them. Glass shatters, and before Donna can hit him and get him to stop he does. Maybe Rose did it, had to have been, and before Donna could fully emerge from her disorientation she was being guided with a cool hand on her back toward the stairs.

* * *

 

Calm.

Rose focused on that word as she, the Doctor, and Donna ran down the corridor that lead to the cubby the Doctor had hidden in earlier that day. Calm was going to keep her grounded and prevent her from running back up stairs and throttling the matron for even attempting to threaten them. She didn't need to show Donna what she was capable of, didn't need to take a step back in her gaining control of her new found instincts.

They stopped exactly where she figured they would be running to, and the Doctor threw open the door and started tossing mops and buckets.

"Well, that's one solution," Donna panted. "Hide in the cupboard, I like it." The Doctor stepped inside and tossed off the back panel. He looked the machine up and down while putting on his specs.

"Did you have anymore luck with it after I left?" Rose asked as he revealed the giant machine thing.

"Nope," He said with a manic grin before reaching in to his pocket and pulling out the sonic pen, wiggling it in his fingers. "But I've got this, I can get past the deadlock" He said as he used the pen on the machine. He took a couple wires out. "She's wired up the whole building." He said, that grin not slipping once.

"Meaning?" Rose asked.

"Meaning we can get a bit of privacy" he said as he held the two wires together and they sparked a bit. Outside in the hall, Rose heard the two guards that had been after them fall to the floor with a grunt. The Doctor shrugged. "Just enough to stop them."

"Are we not concerned about her wiring the whole building?" Rose asked.

"Oh, no, we're worried what that might mean, but for now I'm more concerned with making sure there aren't any more Adiposes being born." He said as he dropped the two wires he had been holding and started fiddling with other parts of the machine.

"You two look older," Donna noted, and Rose turned away from the Doctor's fiddling to look at the red head.

"Been about five or six years for us." Rose replied.

Donna snorted, shaking her head. "Barely a year, me. And all this time you two have been … what?"

Rose shrugged one shoulder, trying not to remember the year that never was, the times she'd slipped during what she called her recovery, anything bad or Bad Wolf that took place.

"Traveling." She finally replied. "Had someone with us for a bit a few years back, but some stuff happened and she left. But she's fine, really. And we, well, we've just been us, yeah? We went through a lot and just wanted to take some time the two of us after it all happened." She forced a smile. "What about you? What'd you do?"

"Tried traveling, didn't work out. Had these dreams of going barefoot over Egypt, or rowing to North America. But you never consider the money it would take, or that even if you had it it's all mostly bus trips, and guidebooks. Wear sunblock and don't drink the water. Two weeks later you're back home and it's back to the same old life. Nothing seems or feels different, you don't … you two changed me in ways that never could. I must have been mad turning down that offer." She replied with a sad smile.

"To come with us?" Rose asked, remembering how badly she wished Donna had decided to.

"Yeah." Donna nodded.

"Do you still want to?" Rose asked without realizing, her heart galloping with hope as she glanced down at the Doctor.

They'd talked about it. After Jack and Tim both declined coming with them, they considered asking the next person that showed potential. But no one had, no one seemed to fit what they had hoped for in a companion.

The surprise in the Doctor's eyes, paired with the smile tugging at the corners of his mouth showed Rose that he was still on board with Donna joining.

"Oh, yes please!" Donna replied, getting their attention.

Rose laughed a yelp of joy, covering her mouth in her own shock before throwing her arms out to pull Donna into an embrace. "You'll likely regret this," She said in to the red hair covering her face.

"I'm sure I will, but I'll also love every second." Donna replied with a laugh.

" _Inducer Activated,"_ A computerized voice said, and string of Gallifreyan came from the Doctor as he pulled on his hair.

"What's it doing?" Donna asked as the machine glowed brighter.

"She's started the program." He said, turning to Rose. "Emergency pathogenesis."

"So it's converting …." Donna stuttered.

"Everything." Rose said. "One life for a dozen or more."

"A million people are gonna die." The Doctor said, staring off a moment before he looked back at what Rose figured was the inducer. "Gotta cancel the signal." He said as he reached into his pocket and pulled out the little gold pendent.

"The Bio-switch," Rose noted.

"Should block the signal." He said as he unscrewed the bottom of it and attached it to one of the wires.

Just as he got hooked on, the computer stated. " _Inducer increasing._ "

"No, no, no, no, no, no! She's doubled it." He growled.

"So you need a second capsule." Rose figured out.

"And it's too far to run back to the offices to get one." He ran a hand roughly over his face. "I can't save them."

"Ahem," Donna said loudly, getting the two of them to look at her. Dangling from her finger was a second capsule still on it's gold chain.

"Donna," Rose said as the Doctor stared with a growing, manic grin. "You're bloody brilliant you are."

She smiled and shrugged as if it was nothing, but Rose could tell by the look in Donna's eyes as the Doctor took the capsule that it had been too long since anyone had said that to her. And she likely didn't believe it, but Rose did. With every fiber of her being.

Suddenly the green light of the machine went out with a puff of smoke, and the Doctor jumped with glee. Laughing, he pulled both the girls to him in a tight hug, and Rose laughed at the surprise on Donna's face.

"Now, I imagine the nursery is on it's way," he said, scratching at his side burn. "Don't quite know what she's wired up the building for though."

"We should probably figure that one out, yeah?" Rose asked, glancing at the machine as the building shook slightly.

"When you say nursery?" Donna asked, putting her arms out to brace herself though the shaking wasn't that strong.

"Nursery ship." The Doctor said as the machine turned itself back on.

"Oh bloody hell," Rose grumbled, but the Doctor shushed her.

"This is a message from the Adiposian First Family," a slightly gargle voice said. Rose listened as Donna said something, but the Doctor quieted her. "These are the instructions which are to be followed at the end of the breeding cycle to be conducted on Sol-3. Regardless of the Adipose production rate, a nursery ship will not arrive after the Inducer is shut off unless it's recognized that a levitation post has been constructed for ease of transference." Rose vaguely heard the Doctor relay the information to Donna. "Due to the of the nature of this seeding, there will be no need for Nannies post birth. The position will be terminated immediately, and parents will be responsible for their own children."

"Oooh," The Doctor said. "We're not the ones in trouble now." He said, his eyes going suddenly bigger. "She is! Come on, to the roof."

* * *

 

They made it to the roof and looked around as thousands of tiny, chubby aliens floated up to the giant space ship hovering over their heads.

"I still say," Rose said as the three of them moved closer to the edge. "Cutest invasion ever." She looked to the Doctor as he took of his specs and pocketed them. "I kinda want one."

"A baby?" He choked, eyes wide and jaw dropped, making Donna laugh.

"No, ya git, an Adipose." Rose replied.

"Which is a baby." The Doctor reiterated.

"It's just a cute little blob of fat." Rose cooed, and he started to smile at her.

"And that cute little bob of fat, as you call it, grows to be over six feet tall and nearly fifty times it's current volume." He said, reaching over and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "And that's exactly why you don't have a puppy from Barcelona, Rose Tyler. Because you only focus on the cute and little, and don't see the big picture of when it grows into a dog big enough to ride like a horse."

"Speaking of horses." Rose mumbled, smirking as she prepared for what was to come next.

"Leave Arthur out of this." The Doctor said firmly, sniffing and turning away. Rose followed his gaze to a little Adipose that noticed them and waved.

"I'm waving at fat," Donna remarked, and Rose giggled. She felt the Doctor's hand clutch hers tightly, and she glanced up to see the smile in his eyes even if one didn't completely grace his face.

"Oh, there she is!" The Doctor said suddenly, running closer to the edge, tugging Rose along with him. "Matron Cofelia, listen to me!" He called to her, letting go of Rose's hand so he could lean against the high ledge of the roof.

"Oh I don't think so, Doctor. And if I never see you or your partners again, it will be too soon."

"Why does no one ever listen?" He grumbled to himself, shaking his head in exasperation. "I'm trying to help. Just get across to the roof!" He called out.

"What? So that you can arrest me?" The Matron asked.

"Your position is being terminated." Rose called back. "The instructions from the Adipose came through, they don't need you anymore."

The Matron laughed. "Look at all these beautiful, healthy children. If it wasn't for your meddling we'd have thousands more, and when the family sees them."

"But that's the thing, this was a one time deal, they know it's illegal to breed on Earth and they won't risk it twice." The Doctor reasoned. "So what's the one thing they'll want to get rid of? Their accomplice, the one who was here doing the work for them."

The Matron's serene, patronizing smile faltered. It vanished completely as the blue light of the levitation beam went out, and she fell with a scream.

Rose closed her eyes, gripping the ledge with white knuckles.

The Matron brought this on herself. She was responsible for her own demise. They tried to save her, but the only way they possibly could was rejected. It's not her fault, her hands are clean.

She would not add the Matron to her list.

"Rose." The Doctor said, putting a hand on her shoulder. She looked to him, seeing him pointing skyward. Rose glanced up in time to see a tiny Adipose waving goodbye, and she managed to wave back with a smile before the ship took off into the night sky.

_~DWDWDW~_

They exited the building, weaving their way through the crowd that gathered, the sirens of police cars, and the flash of ambulance lights luring people to the spectacle and keeping their eyes off them. Which was just fine in Donna's books, because she knew  _exactly_  where she wanted to go now.

"Alright then! TARDIS, come on! Where is it?" She asked when they had a bit more space to stand together as a group.

The Doctor smiled at her as he took Rose's hand, gesturing to the alley around the corner.

Donna's heart started pounding. No. Couldn't be.

She squealed a laugh as the Doctor and Rose led her around the corner, into the alley where she had parked her car. There, not ten feet behind it, stood the TARDIS.

"Here she is," Rose said, letting go of the Doctor's hand and going straight to the ship. She unlocked the door while giving the exterior a little stroke.

"That is like destiny!" Donna proclaimed, getting out her keys and going to the car. "And I've been ready for this." She said as she opened the boot of the car to show off her small collection of suitcases. "I packed ages ago, just in case. 'Cause I thought hot weather, cold weather, no weather, they probably go anywhere." She rambled as she unloaded the suitcases.

"You've got a hat box." The Doctor noted.

"Planet of hats! I'm ready!" Donna proclaimed.

"Here," Rose said with a light grin. "Let me bring these first few in, figure out where the Old Girl is setting you up." She grabbed a couple of the bigger suit cases, throwing the Doctor a wink before carrying them inside the ship.

Donna watched him with fascination, the glimmer of hope in his eyes as he watched Rose head inside the ship, the door shutting a bit behind her.

"You mean to tell me after five years you two still aren't a thing?" She asked. "Because I could tell last time I saw ya that there was something there but you weren't acting on it. And truth be told, and maybe it was just the whole, bloody, thing going on, but you don't seem much different with each other." She stepped closer as he looked at her. "But there's a sparkle in your eyes, one that's grown a lot since she caught up with us."

He put his hands in his pockets. "She laughed." He said, his grin stretching from ear to ear. "You, Donna Noble, made her laugh within, oh, an hour of running into us again? And she's smiling, has been lately, but you …." He shook his head. "I knew she liked you all that time ago, but I didn't know you'd be so…."

"I don't understand," Donna replied, her brow furrowing as she studied his joyful posture.

"We've been together all that time. And happy, we've been happy within our bubble. But you can't live in the bubble forever, no matter how much I try, and outside of it Rose suffers. She blames herself, what she's become, for a lot of things she's not responsible for and you, Donna, I think you made her forget." He took a step closer, arms open. "Couldn't be happier to have you along." The Doctor said, and Donna jumped to give him a tight hug.

"Oh!" She said, the sharp poke in her side as his too skinny frame pressed against her. "Car keys. I won't be a minute, just got to call my mom." She called as she took out her cell phone and started dialing.

"Donna!" Her mother answered on the second ring. "Did you see it?"

"Little fat people, yeah saw it. Listen, Mom, I'm gonna be staying with Veera for a bit."

"There was a space ship in the sky." Her mother stammered, and any other time Donna would have been thrilled that her mother, Sylvia Noble, biggest stick up her ass this side of Chiswick, was anything but steeled against the world.

"Yeah, Spaceship. Listen, I've still got the car keys. There is a bin on Brook Street about thirst feet from the corner. I'm going to leave the keys in there."

That brought her mother back, and as Donna tossed the keys inside the nagging voice returned to say. "What? A bin? You can't do that."

"Oh, stop complaining. The car's just down the road a bit. Gotta go." She smiled. "Really gotta go. Bye." She cut off her mother with a satisfying snap of the cell phone. Donna's eyes fell on the crowd, and a man caught her eye. She smiled fondly at him., and he smiled back.  _You're cute but young,_  she thought, even though he's admittedly her type. Strong build, easy on the eyes but not too pretty. His brown eyes were full of life though he himself looked worn down.

It was one last temptation of the old life, to find a husband and settle down. And there before her was a very handsome, smartly dressed but casual seeming bloke, looking at her expectantly. She could tell him about the keys so he could point them out to her mother, but she could almost hear the borderline racist remarks she'd hear the next time she spoke to the old shrew. She didn't sit well with Lance at first, and this guy looked like he'd had life a bit rougher. Instead she simply waved before heading back into the alley and right inside the TARDIS.

The second the door closed she heard a grinding noise, and looked up to see Rose and the Doctor positioned around what she guessed were the controls, both smiling at her.

"So, Donna. Whole wide Universe, where do you want to go?"

"I know just the place," She said. "Two and a half miles that way." She pointed in the direction of home.

The Doctor chuckled, "We left London."

Donna's grin fell. "Whaddya mean we left London?"

Rose laughed, and the room glowed brighter as if somehow linked to the sound. "Just tell us what you had in mind Donna, and we will make it happen."

"I want to say goodbye to my gramps." She said. "But I wanna make it special. He watches the sky every night from this hill, sits there with his telescope."

"Say no more," The Doctor said, and he and Rose focused on the controls again, neither seeming to notice the glow coming from … a hand. In a jar.

Well isn't that wizard.

"Alright, Donna." The Doctor said. "Open the doors, but don't step out. We're in flight still."

She'd ask about the hand later. Right now, she had more important things to do.

* * *

 

He was close. So, so close. He knew there was something about the redhead that was different, and his Torchwood trained instincts told him that she would somehow have a connection. So after she waved at him, Mickey turned to follow her. He let her round the corner first, and even though she picked up speed he didn't think he'd have to worry about keeping up.

Not until the doors to the TARDIS closed and the engines groaned.

"Shit!" He cursed, a timer on his wrist going off.

No good staying here, not really. Not if they've left, and he still really hoped it was a 'they' situation.

With a sigh, he looked at the band on his wrist, hit the blue button, and a blink later he was back in Torchwood Tower an entire universe away.

"No luck?" Pete asked, a nervous Jackie at his side and an oblivious little boy playing with toy cars at their feet.

Mickey shook his head. "The TARDIS was right there, boss, but." He shrugged. "Just a touch too late."

"And Rose? Did you see her?" Jackie asked, and all Mickey could do was shake his head.

"We still have time," Pete assured them both. "We'll try again in a week. Tweak the dimension canon, see if we can get a better read on the Doctor."

It was the closest they'd come so far, and after so many months of 'maybe next week', Mickey wasn't sure they'd have many more weeks to get it right.

The sky outside was so black these days, and only growing darker.


	4. Fires of Pompeii pt 1

"You're awake." The Doctor said softly as Rose's eyes opened. "No nightmares." He smiled when she focused on him, and she managed to smile back though the fog of sleep.

"Yeah." She stretched, realizing that where she'd fallen asleep on his lap is where she stayed all night. He'd sat up reading in bed, oxford and trousers still on with the rest of his clothes discarded. "So you didn't pick up on my dreams then?" She asked him as she sat up, straightening her t-shirt and pushing her rumpled hair out of her face.

"Not enough skin contact, so no." He said. "Why?"

"Adipose on the TARDIS," She said. "Cute little things having trouble getting up the grating, climbing up over the rotor."

The Doctor hummed happily. "It's nice that you're dreaming things like that again."

"Yeah," She said, scratching the back of neck. "You haven't been this clothed in bed for a while." She noted as she looked him over.

"Complaining?" He teased, chuckling in his throat. "It's just been a while since we've had a companion on board, and by the way that the TARDIS took to Donna, I just figured …." He was cut off by a knock. "There we are." He said as the doorknob turned, and Donna popped her head in.

"What're you still doing in bed?" She asked.

"Sorry Donna," The Doctor leaped off the bed, fetching his tie off the dresser and putting it on. "Rose can sleep all day if I'd let her." He grabbed his blazer and tossed it over his shoulders. "I will get the Old Girl ready to head off. Any where you want to go?"

Donna came more into the room, looking around as she seemed to consider both it and the possible travel location. "Dunno. Somewhere in the past? Not, like, beginning of the Earth past, but you know. Past." She said as she sat down in Rose's vanity chair and the Doctor pulled on his socks and trainers.

"Alrighty, see what we can do." He said, darting out the bedroom and closing the door behind him.

Donna turned to Rose. "Don't worry, not really a morning person myself usually." She admitted, getting Rose to chuckle as she kicked off the blankets. "So, this is your room. His room." She said, looking about as if she still were trying to find the right words.

"Our room, yeah." Rose replied, watching Donna nod nonchalantly. "What do you want to know?" She asked.

"Just how alien is he?" She asked immediately, getting up and sitting beside Rose on the bed. "Because you'd think there'd be laws against that sorta thing, not being the same species. But if I didn't know, I'd never guess. But he's all covered up, too, so I figure there's gotta be something weird about him, right? I mean, who wears that much clothing to bed?"

"He doesn't normally." Rose said as she scooted off the bed and went for the closet.

"Oi, too much." Donna said.

Rose laughed. "You just asked if he was weird under it all." She quipped back as she considered what to wear for the day.

"Yeah, but that's … that's just." Donna stuttered.

"He looks human." Rose helped her as the TARDIS made a purple, sleeveless dress with a scoop neck stick out a little more than the rest. She took it off the hanger and draped it over the vanity chair while she went to the dresser. "There's nothing odd or extra on the outside, it's all internally."

"Whaddya mean?" Donna asked as Rose riffled through the drawer she searched until she found the thirtieth century bra that actually kept things in place while being strapless and comfortable. She often wondered why all the best things came from so far into her previous future, or from other planets entirely. How could it take the human race that long to figure out a solution to a common fashion problem.

"He's got two hearts, a respiratory bypass, so he can go without breathing longer. He's cooler than us, have you noticed? His skin always feels like he's been out in cold and is only just warming up."

"And you …." Donna said, and Rose looked over her shoulder to see the poor woman having trouble coming out and saying it. "Well what about kids? Can he, I mean, is it done the same way?"

Rose laughed. "I … umm, it can't happen at all between us, actually. But, umm, he once told me that if it wasn't for, ah, me, and my inability that we could have possibly ended up pregnant."

"Oh," Donna said, her whole posture sagging. "Sorry. I didn't mean to."

"No, no, it's alright." Rose said as she gathered her clothes and went into the bathroom, closing the door all but a crack so her voice would carry. "I never really wanted kids, never thought I'd be good at it." She smiled sadly to herself as she changed. "He was probably brilliant at it. But I never had the instinct or desire. Then that thing with the huons happened, and a lot of me changed. Part of that was never being able to have kids of my own. One of the small prices to pay." She said as she got her dress on and stepped out. Donna was gapping at her. "What?"

"What do you mean 'he was probably brilliant at it'? Did he run off, leave his family?" Donna asked, her tone a little aggressive.

Rose swallowed. Had she said that? "He's 907." Rose replied, the corners of her mouth tugging upward as Donna's anger left and her jaw dropped. "It's been a while since kids were in the picture." Rose added with a wink, smiling her tongue between her teeth before she went to the vanity to brush out her hair and pin it up.

"907." Donna repeated. "You're datin' a 907 year old alien with two hearts and a cold …. Well that's just wizard."

"Pretty much engaged to him, actually." Rose corrected as she applied her make-up.

Donna laughed behind her. "Blimey, you two are certainly going to make life interesting for me, aren't you?"

"Wait until you meet our friend Jack." Rose said as she got up and put on her flats. "You think a Time Lord/human relationship is odd, he could tell you stories that make us seem perfectly normal."

Donna smiled sincerely, looking about to say something before the bedroom door opened and the Doctor popped his head in.

"I thought we were all eager to get moving?" He asked. "I've been waiting in the console room for twenty-three minutes."

"Did you want me to venture in my jimjams?" Rose asked, and he seemed to really take in what she was wearing.

"Not sure I want you venturing out in that either." He said as he looked her up and down. "Someone might try to steal you."

"You and I both know if anyone tried they'd be hurting." She smirked and crossed her arms.

He beamed. "Quite right. Anyway, Allons-y Rose, Donna. Adventure awaits."

_~DWDWDW~_

"Ancient Rome!" The Doctor proclaimed as he drew back a curtain he parked the TARDIS behind.

"Again," Rose said, stepping aside and letting Donna step out.

"Oi, not like we really got to  _enjoy_  Rome last time we were here. It was all you're a statue, I'm a statue, genie dragon from the future granting wishes it shouldn't have."

"Oh my God!" Donna finally blurted, her elation silencing the Doctor's gob from continuing as she ventured a little further into the street. "It's so Roman. This is fantastic!" She said, returning to the Doctor and hugging him tight enough that his eyes bulged, much to Rose's amusement. "I'm here, in Rome." Donna continued as she let go of the Doctor and grabbed Rose's arms in a death grip. "Donna Noble, in Rome. This is just weird. I mean, everyone here's dead."

"That's a way to look at it," Rose said, a little taken aback as she recalled her first trip to the past. She was genuinely upset when the Doctor told her that Charles Dickens wasn't going to be alive for much longer. It hadn't really occurred to her then that the people she had met weren't technically around anymore.

"Hey, are you two having on me?" Donna asked, dropping her arms and pointing to a sign stating some kind of two for one deal. "That sign's in English. Are we in Epcot or something?"

"Now that would be a place he hasn't taken me." Rose mused. "All of time and space, and we've never been to Disney World."

"I told you, part of the Honeymoon trip." The Doctor replied with a sigh.

"And when will that be, exactly? Seeing as how you still haven't actually asked me to bond with you?" She teased, but he still turned red.

"I said a decade. Decade! Been five years, six tops."

"Oi, you two!" Donna interrupted gruffly. "Are we  _actually_  in Rome or are you just tryin' to be funny?"

"No, we are in Rome." The Doctor replied, seeming grateful for the distraction, regardless how anger Donna seemed. "The TARDIS translates for you, nearly every language in the Universe. She does speech, too. You're talking Latin right now."

Donna's eyes lit up. "Seriously."

"Yep," The Doctor replied.

"I just said 'seriously' in Latin."

"Nifty, ain't it?" Rose asked.

"Bloody brilliant!" Donna replied. "What if I said something in actual Latin? Like 'Veni, vidi, vici'? My dad said that when he came back from football. If I said it, what would it sound like?"

The Doctor shrugged. "I'm not sure."

"Seriously?" Rose asked, moving to stand by Donna, facing him. "You never speak the native language?" She asked curiously.

"Weellll, I speak English." He said, stepping away from the curtain and letting it fall as he put his hands in his pockets. "TARDIS won't translate my language, so I sorta just speak one that I like. And I do speak native, sometimes, but I just … don't normally when I know it's going to be heard differently anyway."

"I'm gonna try it!" Donna said giddily.

"Go for it, let's see what happens." The Doctor replied, moving to stand by Rose and putting his arm around her before following Donna up to a stall holder.

"I came, I saw, I conquered." Donna said to the man selling wares, and he wasn't the only one confused.

"TARDIS translated for you," the Doctor whispered into Rose's ear, sounding amused.

"Ah." Rose simply said.

"Huh?" The merchant said, looking at Donna oddly. "Sorry? Me no speak Celtic." He said as one may in an attempt to be understood, gesturing about like it would help.

"Yeah," Donna said with a mix of humor and disappointment, turning back to them. "How's he mean, Celtic?"

"You sound Welsh. There, we learned something. Or, partially. I guess companion's won't be translated. That or she's having fun."

"I'm going to go with the latter." Rose said as they started heading down the street. "Seems like something she'd do, yeah? Translate any other time but now just to have on Donna?"

"Maybe." The Doctor said. "So, Donna, whaddya think?"

She looked down at her blouse and jeans, then to them. "Don't our clothes look a bit odd? I mean, Rose might pass as a local, maybe. Dress is too short, but us?"

"Ancient Rome, anything goes." He said. "It's like Soho, but bigger."

Rose rolled her eyes before leaning around him to look at Donna. "Normally he'd warn us if we were going to the past so we could go to the TARDIS wardrobe and find something more Era appropriate. He almost never changes. But don't worry 'bout it, been a couple times we went back in the past and didn't change. Usually doesn't give us problems."

Donna nodded, accepting this as she looked around her, seeming to take it all in.

Rose did too, and while she knew there was a chance they were in a different part of Rome than before, nothing looked familiar.

"Sure it's Rome we're in?" She asked him, looking up at his furrowed brow. Only then did she realize his walls were high, too high even for her to feel the normal flow of affection.

"Yeah," he said, looking about. "Just, something is very off. There's a hum in my mind, like something's here that shouldn't be. And did you notice? There's no Colosseum, Pantheon, anything that should be looming by now."

They continued down the road when Donna paused, backed up a few steps, and looked curiously at the horizon.

"Donna, what is it?" Rose asked as she and the Doctor turned toward her.

"There are seven hills of Rome, aren't there?" She asked, and Rose and the Doctor moved to stand beside her. "So how come they've only got one?" She asked, pointing to the large mountain towering over the city.

The ground beneath them started to quiver, and Rose shifted to grip the Doctor as if she could protect him somehow. The locals seem unperturbed, or at the most annoyed, mild grumbles or odd chuckles as they held things down or grabbed hold of items falling down.

"Wait. One mountain. Smoke. Are we?"

"In Pompeii." The Doctor said, his walls slipping enough for the panic to come through. "We're in Pompeii, and it's Volcano day."

"Oh god." Rose said, watching the smoke billow upward.

"We have to get back to the TARDIS now!" He said, and he grabbed her hand, maneuvering to take Donna's as well and pulled them at a run back the way they came.

They got a few odd looks as they passed by people, and Rose thought she may have even heard some chuckles. Not a single one of those people mattered when they arrived to the alcove where they parked, the Doctor pulled back the curtain, and the TARDIS was gone.

"You're kidding," She and Donna said in unison.

"Not telling me the TARDIS has gone?" Donna added as Rose stepped into the space where the ship should be.

"Okay," The Doctor replied.

"Don't do that," Rose growled. "Don't be all clever with her like that."

"It's alright," the Doctor tried to placate. "She wouldn't have taken off without us, we'll just … ask around." He said, glancing about and then headed toward the merchant Donna had been talking to earlier. "'Scuse me," he said, getting the merchant's attention. "There was a box there, a big, blue, wooden box just over there. Where is it gone?"

The Merchant smiled smugly. "Sold it, didn't I?"

"But, it wasn't yours to sell." The Doctor protested, his voice going up a few octaves.

"On my patch, wasn't it? I got 15 aureus for it."

"Who did you sell it to?" The Doctor asked.

The Merchant shrugged, looking down at the metal thing in his hand. "Can't say."

"You what?" Rose asked calmly, clearing her throat, stepping up the man.

"Rose," The Doctor said cautiously, but she ignored him. Her heart was hammering as she fought to keep the protective instinct under control, only this time it wasn't the Doctor she was concerned for.

"I can't say." The Merchant repeated more smugly.

Rose smiled sweetly before shoving the merchant hard. He bounced off the wall a little, eyes wide with surprise as he dropped what ever was in his hand to the ground with a thud. He put his hands up by his head, gazing at her Rose put her hand firmly on his chest, near enough to his neck that if she had to use force she was ready. "Say that again, I dare ya." She said softly.

"He didn't give a name." The Merchant rushed out. "He just asked to have it delivered to Caecilius and Metella's house. It was 15 aureus, I didn't want to ask too many questions."

"And where would we find this house?" She asked, finger grazing the man's collarbone.

"He's on Foss street. Big Villa, can't miss it. Down this road, turn the corner at the cloth merchant."

"Thank you." She said sweetly, pulling her hand back and turning away, the merchant still against the wall as if she was keeping him pinned there.

She couldn't look the Doctor or Donna in the eye as she lead the way for most of the trip, keeping her head bowed as her eyes darted up from the ground in search of the shop. Rose felt the Doctor's hand graze hers a couple times, and it wasn't until her heart settled that she finally allowed him to clasp it.

" _You okay?"_ He asked in her mind, and she shook her head. " _You didn't hurt him, you only surprised him. Rose, it's okay, I'd have probably done the same._ "

She looked up, met his eye.  _"We both know that's not true_ ," She said, back.

He sighed, and she felt his desperation before he cut himself off again.

She waited for Donna to say something, but nothing came. When Rose glanced up, she expected to see fear but Donna looked only mildly worried, and maybe a bit annoyed.

"Donna?" Rose asked cautiously.

"Why aren't we finding an giant bell and ringing it as hard and loud as we can and warning them?" Donna asked in turn. "All these people, we could save them. That's what you two do, isn't it? Save people?"

"Not this time," the Doctor said, and Rose stopped short along with Donna. He looked between the two of them. "Pompeii is a fixed point in time, so tomorrow when that thing erupts we'll be gone, and everything that's happened still will. We can't stop it."

"Says who?" Donna challenged as Rose understood.

"Says me!" The Doctor growled.

"And are you in charge?" She asked.

"Yes," he said, taking a step closer to her, towering over her with his eyes cold. "You sound about the place, announce the end of the world, and they'll just a mad old soothsayer."

"Hey," Rose said, firm and gently, stepping between them. She placed a hand on the Doctor's chest gently while she looked to Donna. "When the Doctor says that's a fixed point, what he means is changing what happens would be very bad. So bad, we may not exist to come back in time to do the damage. Trust me, Donna." She said gently, getting Donna to look her in the eye. The storm in the blue-green eyes looking back into Rose's hazel ones was oddly familiar but lacked something.

Eventually Donna nodded, her lips pursed as if she thought it was all a bunch of bull but didn't say anything.

They continued on to Matella's home, who ever Matella was, and it didn't take long to find it exactly as the merchant described.

They entered as the home, another Earth quake shook the ground, and a lovely middle aged woman ran toward them with her focus on something else entirely.

Just as Rose noticed the bust about to fall over, the Doctor bent to catch it then righted it back in it's place.

"Thank you, sir." The woman said with a tilt of her head. "What can I help you with?"

"I would say they're likely here for trade, Matella." A man with graying hair and sharp features said from a few feet away. He was dressed fairly well, Rose thought, considering togas where the fashion of the day. He had this knowing smile to him, eyes falling on her with an intense gaze that made her look away.

"Oh!" Matella, the woman before them, said with alighted eyes. "My husband can be quite flighty at times. Takes off for a few days and forgets to tell me anything. If it wasn't for his silent partner showing up, I'm sure the business would have just been an absolute mess. I am Matella, not sure if Caecilius has mentioned me or not in your dealings."

"It's quite alright," The Doctor said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out his psychic paper. "Because we are inspectors."

"Marble inspectors!" Matella said as she took the paper from him, looking wide eyed at the paper in her hands.

Rose swore she heard the man snort, but she could barely look over at him for more than a few seconds. As she, the Doctor, and Donna went further into the room she felt his eyes follow her. It was nearly unnerving, especially as none of her fight  _or_  flight instincts were kicking in.

Matella strode over to a teenage boy who had been sitting beside a water feature and plucked the goblet from his hands. She poured it into the water, much to the young man's protests, before turning to the man. "Did you know they were coming?" She asked him.

"Oh, I had an inkling." He replied as if it amused him, which apparently did not amuse Matella.

"I do apologize," She said, glancing back at the paper before handing it back to the Doctor. "We were not prepared for this, Mister Spartacus."

"Quite alright," he said, pocketing the paper.

"What a funny coincidence." The Man said, and it was only then that she realized that he sounded a little different than the rest of those in the room in way she couldn't put her finger on. "I am also Spartacus. Perhaps we're distant relatives."

"Perhaps." The Doctor said, looking at Spartacus like he was an idiot.

Which, Rose noted, he did the same to the Doctor.

"And this must be your sister." He said, pointing to Donna. "You two look quite alike."

"Really?" The Doctor and Donna said in unison.

"Oh yes," Spartacus replied, winking at Rose when she met his eye.

And she blushed, so much so she felt the need to fan her face.

"Huh," The Doctor said. "Yes, well, my sister Donna, and my lovely  _wife_  Rose."

"She's not your wife." Spartacus said with absolute certainty. "Doesn't bare any of the characteristics of a married woman."

"I thought you said you had a wife yourself." Matella said with a bitter tone, looking coldly to Spartacus.

He smiled, still without pulling his eyes from Rose. "I do."

"I'm sorry," The Doctor said quite loudly, getting everyone's attention. "But as the marble inspector I must say that  _that,_ " He said, pointing to an unmistakable corner of a blue wooden box peeking out from behind the curtain, "looks like wood."

"I told you not to bring that  _thing_  into my house." Matella growled at Spartacus.

"And I told you that Caecilius said it was fine if I kept it here in the meantime. I showed you the letter he left."

"Indeed," She said, mumbling something about making that man pay.

"I'm sure it's fine," The Doctor said nonchalantly as he strolled over to the TARDIS and pulled the curtain away from her. "But I might have to take it off your hands for a proper inspection."

"You said you were marble inspectors." Spartacus challenged smugly.

"Yes, well, marble with dabbling in … wood inspecting. Also. Sorta," He scratched at his side burn. "Sorta've a hobby. Anyway, we can get this off your hands and return when Caecilius does. You know, in a couple days."

"He should be back from Rome by then." Matella nodded.

"Well why don't you go meet him?" Donna said quite suddenly, getting everyone's attention. "Grab your family and go surprise him. Sure a family as rich as you lot would have a second cart or something."

"What are you doing?" The Doctor asked Doctor through his teeth as he grinned.

"Well I'm just thinking that this Caecilius bloke would be missing his family after his long travels. Perhaps, maybe, he'd like to meet up with them?"

"Why would we do that?" Matella asked, confusion coming over her.

"Well, the volcano, for starters." Donna replied, and Rose heard the echo of a groan around her.

"What?" The teenager asked, looking at Donna just as the Doctor told her people would.

"Volcano," Donna repeated.

"What-ano?" The young man asked, more amused.

"The great, big volcano right on your doorstep?" Donna insisted.

"Oh, Spartacus Donna, for shame," The Doctor made a big production, looking to Donna as if he  _was_  absolutely ashamed. "We haven't even greeted the household gods yet. Rose, please, join us." He said, glancing between her and the actual Spartacus.

Maybe the Doctor knew, maybe he didn't, the older man's eyes never looked away from her. She felt his gaze follow her across the room, the dash of longing that went with it, and it was starting to become a bit annoying.

"They don't know what it is." The Doctor said as they approached the shrine and worked his way through the rituals for show. "Vesuvius is just a mountain to them, the top hasn't blown off yet. The Romans haven't even got a word for volcano. Not until tomorrow."

"Oh great," Donna said sarcastically. "They can learn a new word as they die."

"Donna, stop it." The Doctor growled.

"Oi, don't you tell me to stop, Spaceman. That boy is what? Sixteen? And tomorrow he burns to death."

"And that's my fault?" The Doctor asked her.

"Right now, yes," Donna retorted.

Rose sighed, shaking her head and turning away from the argument. When she caught Spartacus staring at her again, she glowered at him. It burned her that he found it amusing.

Someone appeared in the door way, getting everyone's attention. "Announcing Lucius Petrus Dextrus, Chief Auger of the City Government."

Spartacus sneered and grumbled turning away as the pompous looking man sauntered in with men at his back.

"Lucius, a pleasure, as always." Metella greeted before turning to her son. "Quintus, stand up." She snapped at him, and the young man rolled his eyes as he got to his feet. "It is an honor that you would come." She said back to Lucius."

"The birds are flying north, and the wind is in the west." Lucius said with such severity that Rose snorted, and quickly covered her mouth to hid the threatening smile.

"Oh," Matella said, bringing her hands together and knotting her fingers. "That's excellent, is it not?"

"Only the grain of wheat knows where it will grow." Lucius replied, sounding bored.

"Right." She said. "You will excuse me, Lucius, but Caecilius is away and I do have company. May I introduce Spartacus, um, Spartacus, his sister Spartacus Donna, and Rose." She said, the strangeness of the day seeming to finally start to wear on her polite expression.

"A name is but a cloud upon a summer wind." Lucius waved them off.

"But the wind is felt most keenly in the dark," The Doctor replied, and all Rose could do was arch a brow at him

"Ah," Lucius perked up. "But what is the dark, other than an omen of the sun."

"I concede that every sun must set," The Doctor replied, to which the pompous government man gave a snort of triumph. "And yet, the son of the father must also rise." The Doctor finished, a hand raised in Qunitas's direction.

"Damn," Lucius replied as his smile fell.

"Put you in your place." Rose grinned.

"And yet evidently, has failed to put you in yours." Lucius countered.

"I am no bird, and no net ensnares me." Rose quipped back, quoting  _Jane Eyre_  while fully knowing that there were only two people in the room who could possibly know that.

Lucius looked her over. "A woman of learning, how intriguing."

"She's Celtic," Spartacus said over his shoulder.

"She can speak for herself." Rose half growled back.

"Oh I am well aware," Spartacus flirted back.

Flirted.

Rose's jaw dropped, and she allowed the Doctor to loop his arms around her in an overly possessive manner as she just stared at the bold Spartacus until the older man looked away.

"I came to see if Caecilius completed what I asked for." Lucius said, turning back to Matella.

"Exactly as you specified." Matella said as she moved swiftly across the room and pulled the sheet off something propped up on an easel. "Does it please you?"

It was a carving of a circuit, or part of a circuit, chiseled into the perfect, square, marble tile.

Lucius moved toward it, stroking the ridges with a light touch, and Rose felt the Doctor's curiosity spike just as hers had.

"As the rain pleases the soil," Lucius replied.

The Doctor moved to look closer at it. "Oh, now that's different." He said putting on his specs. "Where did you get the vision for this?" he asked Lucius.

"On the rain and mist and wind." Lucius replied.

"So you're not gonna tell us then?" Rose crossed her arms, ignoring the dark look Lucius was giving her. She thought she heard Spartacus mumbled something, and looked over her shoulder to see he had drifted closer.

"That looks like a circuit." Donna nodded, moving toward the Doctor, standing beside him.

"Made of stone," The Doctor agreed.

Donna turned to Lucius. "Do you mean you just dreamt that thing up?" She asked in disbelief.

"That is my job as City Auger." He replied, his chest puffing up a bit.

"What's that, then, like the mayor?"

"Oh Spartacus," Spartacus said, a smile pulling a bit on his mouth. "I think you've been traveling too long," He stepped around Rose, but did not close the gap to Lucius. "They'd just come in from Barcelona, the she-Spartacus had been there too long. Forgot basic things like Augers telling the future." He sounded northern.  _Really_  northern. So northern he could be Scottish. It only made Rose furrow her brow at him.

"They're laughing at us," A soft, female voice said from the back of the room, and Rose turned to see a pale, sickly teenage girl leaning against the doorway. "The four of them are mocking us, using words and paper like tricksters created by the gods."

"We meant no offense." The Doctor said.

"Speak for yourself," Spartacus replied.

"Oi, rude." Rose said without thinking.

"I know," He said cheekily, an undertone of 'you like it' in there.

Even the Doctor looked at him curiously, furrowing his brow a bit, but was distracted by Metella's voice. "I'm sorry, my daughter's been consuming the vapors."

"Oh for gods, mother, what have you been doing to her? She's sick, just look at her." Quintus chided, looking genuinely concerned for his sister's well being.

"I gather I have a rival in this household. Another with the gift." Lucius's voice sounded amused.

Metella stood closer to her daughter. "Evelina has been promised to the Sibylline Sisterhood. The say she has remarkable visions." She stated proudly.

Lucius waved it off. "The prophecies of women are limited and dull, only menfolk have the capacity for true perception."

Rose let out a "ha!"

"I'll tell you where the wind's blowing right now, mate." Donna scoffed, looking the pompous ass over like she was assess a threat.

The house shook, but only mildly.

"The Mountain God marks your words. I'd be careful if I were you." Lucius said in an attempt to put Donna in her place. She looked at Rose, her lip curled and her snark evident on her face as she gestured to Lucius in a statement they could both agree on: the man was an idiot.

"Consuming the vapors, you said?" The Doctor stopped any chance of an argument, stepping closer to Evelina.

"They give me strength." She countered.

"Don't think so." Spartacus retorted.

"Nor do I," The Doctor said as he got just that small bit nearer.

"Is that your opinion?" Evelina retorted, looking all the world like a teenage girl arguing with a parent. "As a doctor?"

Tension shifted around the room, foot steps came closer, and just as the Doctor found words any that formed in Rose's throat vanished.

A cool hand was placed on her bare shoulder, and the jolt that went through her tingled nearly all her nerves. She was looking at the Doctor's back but felt his presence in her mind, felt his love for her in her soul, and a trickle of humor at her shock. She shifted her eyes, meeting that of Spartacus. He smiled lightly and knowingly, winking at her with those ancient eyes that she couldn't fully see with the distance he had put between them from the beginning.

"Doctor," Evelina replied. "That's your name." She glanced briefly at the older Doctor before looking at Rose. "Accompanied by your Wolf, your protector, your mate." She looked to Donna. "And you, you call yourself Noble."

"Now then, Evelina, don't be rude." Metella nervously chided.

"No, no, let her talk." The Doctor said.

" _I can only half remember all of this._ " Older Doctor said in her mind, his Scottish accent throwing her off. " _Memory is bad this time around as it is._ "

Rose still couldn't bring herself to say anything.

"You all come from so far away, from different places, different stars." Evelina went on.

"The female soothsayer is inclined to invent all sorts of vagaries."

"Oh not this time, Lucius." The younger Doctor said, turning back to Lucius with a bit of a smug grin. "I reckon you've been out-soothsayed."

"Is that so, man from Gallifrey?" Lucius countered, and Rose tensed.

" _Calm._ " The Doctor at her side said, sending her the matching feeling through her. It was instant, practiced, and made Rose ease all of her tensions easily.

"What?" The Doctor in the suit said as he looked at Lucius with disbelief.

"Strangest images. Your home is lost in fire is it not."

As the younger Doctor's eyes clouded, the older Doctor let slip a wave of aggression that nearly took Rose's breath away. He immediately sent her apologies and calm, relaxing himself once more.

"And you," Lucius turned to Donna. "Daughter of London."

"How does he know?" Donna asked.

"This is the gift of Pompeii. Every single oracle tells the truth." He turned to Rose, looking her dead in the eye. "We know of those who can not die and have little regard for life." He said. "After all, the wolf must hunt."

No amount of calm could keep her at the Older Doctor's side, and she shook his hand from her shoulders as she stepped forward, rage in her eyes.

Lucius looked unperturbed.

"The wolf protects her pack," Evelina said, drawing everyone's attention and stopping Rose short. "Lords of time are her mate, and she was once time itself." She said, her eyes looking glazed. "Another is coming. Two will be born. One will die, the other lost. The pack will grow but can not remain large. It will all fade with the blink of the stars." And Evelina collapsed.

Metella and the Doctor picked her up, and in the frenzy of everything, the Doctor picking her up for Metella and carrying her where the lady of the house indicated, Donna rushing after them. Quintus mumbled something about wine and disappeared. No one but Rose and the older Doctor were left in the room when Lucius plucked up the tile.

"You will give my thanks to Caecilius." He turned and left, the body guards following suit.

"Alone at last." The Doctor said to her, low in her ear, and she whirled around and slapped him hard enough across the face to make her mother proud. "Ah!" He said, rubbing his reddened cheek. "I thought only other you was mad at me, why're you so slap happy?"

"You stole the TARDIS." She half yelled.

He smiled. "Suppose I did."

"What would you go and do that for?" She demanded.

"Circular paradox," He replied like it was obvious. "Had to steal it so you could come up 'ere, didn't I? How else were we gonna investigate the things goin' on 'ere if I allowed myself to swan off and let history run its course?" She cracked a grin. She really, really didn't mean to, but Rose couldn't help but find the accent adorable. "What's so funny?" He asked.

"Why do you sound Scottish?" She asked. "And don't you dare say lots of planets have a Scotland."

"Damn," He replied, causing her to chuckle. "Fine, someone very important to our future was Scottish."

"Why do you look so much older?" She asked, a fuzzy memory at the edge of her psyche telling her that he should be younger.

"Got some news not long before I regenerated that made me feel … old." He said. "Guess it affected me." And then, as she had expected earlier, he looked almost sheepish. "This you doesn't like it, though."

"Actually, I think it's quite dashing. Eyebrows are a sight, though."

"Time lord eyebrows." He said, shifting both of them, and she giggled again.

"So what happened?" She asked, crossing her arms and looking sternly at him. "What did you do that made me so angry? Especially if I'm not here." She glanced around. "I'm not, am I?"

"No," He said. "I may have made a very poor decision that made you and a companion of ours quite … upset. She left, you flew the TARDIS here, pushed me out the door, and said you _may_  pick me up before the Volcano explodes. That was a week ago."

At that, Rose didn't know if she should laugh or want to kill her future self.

"I may have pushed things too far." He conceded. "Happens in old age."

Before Rose could ask how old he was, she heard the familiar foot falls of her current Doctor re-entering the room. "Spartacus." He bit out.

"Spartacus." Older Doctor replied with amusement.

Her younger Doctor rolled his eyes as he shook his head. "Didn't take you long to cozy up to him, did it?" He said with a jealous undertone.

"First thing she did was slap me." Older Doctor said, getting her younger one to smile a bit.

"Quite right, too." He said, preening a bit as if it were some sort of compliment.

"Don't start, you two." She grumbled. "I will  _not_ tolerate your insulting yourself like you did on the Cupla ship."

"Might be able to manage. Whaddya say tight suit?" Older Doctor said.

"Tight suit? Hearing going in my old age, is it?" Her Doctor countered. "And I do look  _old_."

"Surprised you heard anything considering how far your regeneration has its head shoved up …."

"I. Said. No. Insulting." Rose growled, and the both deflated, though the older one for only a moment.

"Forgot how feisty you were before you turned a thousand." He noted, giving her a once over with a sly sort of grin.

Rose was about to growl at him before she processed what he said. Her muscles went limp, and her breathing a touch unsteady. "I'm, I'm sorry. H-how old did you say I was? With you now?"

He grinned, chuckling a bit. "Oh, who has vanity issues now?"

She may have died from shock, Rose wasn't sure. But as her big brain betrayed her wishing not to know, repeated and calculated what age he could possibly be, how old she was at least, the world went fuzzy. The room spun, she heard both Doctors call out to her, and the world went black before she hit the floor.

* * *

 

Donna stood by Metella as she looked over the very pale Evelina. She was clammy, and Donna remembered how sickly the poor girl looked when she stumbled in to the room.

Metella was ever the dotting mother, calmly dabbing away the sweat from her daughter's brow and body,

"She didn't mean to be rude." She eventually said, glancing up at Donna briefly. "She's ever such a good girl, but when the gods speak through her sometimes the words escape her."

"'S alright." Donna replied kindly, watching as Metella moved her touch to a bandage wrapped around Evelina's arm. She untied the knot, unraveling the bandage and revealed the rough, gray skin beneath it. "What is that?" She asked, leaning a little closer.

"Irritation of the skin," Metella replied a she moved her cloth to a smaller basin filled with a green-tint liquid. "We bathe it in olive oil every night, try to sooth it. She never complains, bless her." Matella was about to dab the affected skin but stopped, turning up to Donna. "She said you've come from far away. Please, have you ever seen anything like it?"

Donna looked apprehensively at it, hand hesitating to reach out for it. Metella gave a slight nod, and it was all Donna needed to stroke the skin on Evelina's arm.

Only it wasn't skin.

Her hand jerked back. "It's stone." She said, and Mettella looked like she didn't quite believe it.

She let her own fingers caress her daughters arm before shaking her head and continued the process of coating the area.

A servant came in, handing Donna a beautiful purple garment and walked out.

"A lady such as yourself should be dressed more appropriately." Metella said kindly, only briefly glancing up. "Your friend is a little … modern. And while one Spartacus says she's married, the other doesn't. I can't tell which is telling the truth, the way the both seemed to be looking at her, but her dress is somewhere between the married and single."

Donna kinda gave a chuckle. "Well, they're sorta engaged, I guess. So is between single and married." Donna looked down at the tunic. "Where would you like me to change?"

"There's a screen over there," Metella gestured around the corner. "Around the corner."

Donna nodded gratefully and then stepped behind. The garment could easily be worn over her current clothes, her blouse thin enough that she wouldn't get too warm. It amused her to think that she was half teasing the Doctor only this morning for his multi-layer get up, and now here she was pulling off a similar thing. As she pulled the garment over her head, she heard Evelina stirring, and while she couldn't hear any words, Donna instantly picked up on the sheer relief in Metella's voice. A proper mother, even if she was unwittingly letting her daughter turn to stone.

She stepped out from behind the screen, smiling at Metella as she passed the woman leaving. "Would you mind keeping her company," The mistress of the house asked her. "In all the commotion around Evelina I failed to ensure Quintas behaved, or that Lucius was properly seen out. There's so much to check on, and …."

"I'd be happy to," Donna assured her with a hand on Metella's shoulder.

She smiled and nodded, leaving the room while Donna returned to Evelina's bedside.

"So your mother said I didn't dress lady like enough, whaddya think?" She asked, twirling around and striking a pose. Evelina grinned. "Not sure if I pull it of," She added, becoming a bit more animated. "Always told purple clashed with my hair. Well, my mother said that, but I'm pretty sure I nothin' would make my mum happy." Evelina grinned, laughing a little. "So, what d'you say? Look like the Goddess Venus, or maybe Minerva?"

"Oh that's sacrilege." The teenager said, though Donna could tell the girl wasn't scandalized. In fact, she'd wager the poor things was starved for a friend. A proper girl chat.

"Made you laugh though, d'innit?" She teased before coming and sitting beside Evelina. "So what do ya do in ol' Pompeii, girls your age? You go mates? Go hanging about the market?"

Evelina shook her head. "I am promised to the Sisterhood for the rest of my life. It leaves little time for socializing."

"Did ya get any choice in that?" Donna asked gently but without accusation.

"It's not my decision," Evelina replied firmly, her posture that of strength and pride. "The Sisters chose for me. I have the gift of sight."

No Doctor or Rose to tell her not to, the urge to ask the question Donna had wanted to since the whole 'battle of the psychics' back in the room with the fountain was too strong to fight. So it was a fixed point, sure, what ever that means. But … what if they were warned? What if they had someone, a soothsayer or whatever, tell them what was on the way.

"Then what can you see happening tomorrow?" she asked carefully, watching Evelina.

"Is tomorrow special?" She asked.

"You tell me," Donna replied with a touch of cheek, keeping the whole exchanged as friendly as possible.

Evelina humored her and closed her eyes. "The sun will rise. The sun will set. Nothing special at all." She said in an almost 'I told you so' fashion. It reminded Donna a touch too much of herself as a teenager.

"Look," Donna said, glancing around the room. "Don't tell the Doctor or Rose I said anything, 'cause they'd kill me, but I've got a prophecy too."

Evelina gasped, and covered her eyes with her hands.

Donna honestly couldn't say she noticed the eyes painted on the back of the girl's hands. They were feminine looking with no irises, and were made to look like they were trying to be Evelina's eyes in place of her own. Shaking it off, she continued. "Everything I'm about to say to you is true, I swear. Just listen to me, tomorrow that mountain is gonna explode."

"That's not true," Evelina replied quickly, shaking her head but keeping her eyes covered.

"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry, but everyone's gonna die." Donna urged.

"There can only be one prophecy." Evelina insisted.

"Alright," Donna said gently despite her frustrations. "Even if you don't believe me, just tell your mother to take you and your brother to meet with your father. Get out of Pompeii by tomorrow."

Evelina shook her head violently. "This is false prophecy." She insisted, and suddenly Donna didn't feel so good about trying to talk sense into this poor girl. What ever she'd been smoking to turn her arm stone was obviously distressing her in other ways.

"I'm sorry," Donna added softly, placing a gentle pat on Evelina's knee, and ventured off to see if she could find Rose or the Doctor.


	5. Fires of Pompeii pt 2

"So where's your Rose?" She heard the Doctor, the younger one, her current one, ask despite her still not seeing anything.

"In our TARDIS." The older, Scottish one replied. Rose wanted to open her eyes but found she couldn't quite yet. She hadn't died, right? It's not like she heard about her age and had a heart attack. Oh god, over a thousand years old.

"And she's not here because…?"

"Pissed'er off." He said bluntly. "That, and I think she remembered this. Remembered I'm supposed to be here."

She opened her eyes slowly as she heard the sound of metal being pulled from stone. "Different sort of hypocaust." Her current Doctor remarked, and she could see the blurred outlines of them both slowly coming into focus.

"Earthquake seventeen years ago caused all the locals to rebuild." The other Doctor said, and Rose could see them both huddled around a warming vent, her Doctor kneeling, the other sitting on the edge. She shifted a bit, realizing one of them had set her down on a sofa. "This is where the girl, Evelina, comes to 'consume'. All the soothsayers and the like do it."

The younger one reached in, a moment later leaning back with his fingers pinched together.

"Rock dust?" The older asked.

She saw the tip of the younger one's tongue dart out. "Vesuvius." He said. "They're breathing in the mountain."

"Forgot how strong the sense of taste was in that body." The older one mused.

"And where are your senses strongest?"

"Can't tell you that." The older one quipped. "Though Rose has been awake long enough to see you tasting dirt, so I wouldn't be expecting much in the way of affection."

"Least you still know me." She replied with a light smile as she sat up. Her current Doctor whipped his head around and looked at her, the other laughing quietly at him.

"Feeling any better?" Her Doctor asked, smiling at her before coming over to her side.

"Yeah," She replied. "Learning I'd live as long as you do was interesting, but to hear it's actually  _been_  thousands of years."

"You're still as gorgeous then as you are now, promise." Her Older Doctor replied, and the fact that she thought of him as  _hers_  made her smile with her tongue between her teeth.

"So the fortune tellers are breathing in the mountain." The suit wearing Doctor got them back on track, slipping her arm around her waist as he sat beside her.

"And from what I understand they all started getting things right once they had." The older Doctor told them. "Been here a week, and while I've yet to be called out like I was today, I'd heard a few things that were just a touch too … true. But not one of them mentions the volcano."

"Still havin' Earthquakes, so it's happening, yeah?" Rose asked, looking between the two Time Lords.

"Fixed point, has to happen." The Older one said a bit to brashly.

"Well, yeah, but … what else's going on here? The predictions, the circuit-like tile." She said, looking at the Older one intensely.

He smirked. "I don't know the answers, Love." He said. "I remembered being at the fall of Pompeii  _vaguely_. I didn't really remember this whole conversation, but I knew it was coming just like I knew I had to steal the TARDIS to get you all up here."

"How can I remember any of it, I'm crossing my own time line?" The Doctor beside her asked, scratching at his side burn.

"The memory will slip after certain events." He said. "You'll lock most of this day away, a filter over these earlier parts, but then it will all sorta fade later."

"You're going aren't you?" Rose asked him bluntly.

He smiled at her. "Clever girl."

"Not going to stick around for the big finale?" Current Doctor asked with false disappoint layered so heavily she smacked him on the chest.

"No, I have to go meet my 'partner' between here and Rome, find a way to get him to stay in one spot."

"So he'll live." Rose nodded.

"Among other reasons." Older Doctor shrugged. He then strode over, picking up her hand and kissing her knuckles. "I will see you later, Love." He said before stepping past the two of them and out the room without another word to his younger self.

"Well, of all the times I've ran into myself, I'd say that's gone the easiest." The Doctor preened, taking his hand back and straightening his tie. "Though why do I sound Scottish? I thought I was done with Scottish. Scottish," He repeated in the namesake accent. "Whaddya think, Rose?" He asked, "Should I be Scottish? No," He halted her, voice back to normal, "No, can't do that. I sound ridiculous."

"Really, cause I kinda liked it." Rose noted.

He smirked, raised an eyebrow, looked like he was going to say something then stopped. Rose watched as his face fell and his brow furrowed. "Is that why you were more open with him? Different body?"

Rose's eyebrows hit her hairline. "No, not at all. You … you don't think I'm open with you?"

"Not like you used to be. Not like before …." He stopped himself, looking down at the floor, his Adam's apple bobbing. "I often feel like you blame me for everything."

"I blame myself," Rose said firmly. "You didn't ask me to do any of the things I have. You always tell me to calm, to back off, but I don't always listen and that's on me." She cupped his face. "Have I been too distant for you?"

He smiled thinly, leaning in and placing a lingering kiss on her lips. "Only a little. Worried you're regretting all this."

"You just heard, I'm with you a thousand years from now." She smiled, hers as thin as his. "Maybe you're only with me then cause you have to be."

"Nope," He said, popping the 'p' though still keeping his voice hushed. "Not possible." He kissed her again, other hand coming up to cradle her head.

"Oi, you two!" Donna's voice startled them apart. "No alien tongue sucking, or what ever it is you do."

"Right you are, Donna." He said, getting up to his feet. "So, I'm going to see a boy about an Arger." He said as he smiled manically between the two women, hands in his pockets.

"Sorry?" Rose asked, giving her head a shake before standing up.

"I'm going to ask Quintus nicely if he'll take me to where Lucius lives, see if I can find anything more about those circuit tiles."

"And what about us?" Rose asked, crossing her arms and waiting his usual and extremely pointless protests of wanting her safe.

He looked seriously at Rose. "Find out what you can, if anything about Eveline's health and the sisterhood. Don't leave the villa, and don't cause trouble." He said, looking pointedly at Donna at the last bit.

"Be careful," Rose cautioned.

"Me? I'm always careful," He said with a grin, kissing her briefly on the cheek before disappearing.

Rose huffed, one Doctor going off and doing something that will likely be risking his life, another Doctor out there roaming the Italian country side without a TARDIS. And while she was sure the latter had to have been able to take care of himself by now, the former was going to have her worried and on edge until he came back.

"About Evelina," Donna said, getting Rose's attention. The women came together, and both glanced around the room before Donna quietly added, "there's something wrong with her arm."

* * *

 

"Hello, Evelina," Rose said gently after wrapping on the entryway. The teen girl looked up skeptically. "Donna told me about your arm, may I see it?" She asked, gesturing to the bandage as she came closer to the bed.

Evelina hesitated, holding it closer to her body a moment before nodding and extended it toward Rose.

Between hearing what the Doctors had been discussing, and then Donna's clearly diced story about her encounter with the young woman had Rose concerned and curious. Concerned that something was invading the poor girl, and curious as to what the heck was going on in Pompeii. Circuit tiles, mountain breathing soothsayers who get things right, it all seemed too alien for Rose's taste.

She took it, gently unwrapping the area and revealing the stone beneath it. "Does it hurt?" She asked.

Evelina shrugged. "Sometimes." She admitted.

"When did it start?" Rose asked.

"When I started consuming the vapors, as was the request of the Sisterhood." She replied, eyeing Rose wearily still.

Rose smiled as gently as she could, sensing Donna in the doorway, keeping her distance. The look in Evelina's eyes, the distrust, and the way Donna had glazed over her mention the volcano to the teenager only confirmed what she was suspecting. She shot a quick glare to Donna over her shoulder before turning back to Evelina.

"Maybe you could find another way to gain insight." She said as she ran her hand over the stone taking over the girl's body. Evelina looked like she was a bout to protest, so Rose raised a hand to stop her. "There's stone in the vapors." She said.

"Your husbands tell you that?" Evelina said quietly. "Or, one is your husband, the other not yet. How can there be two men who are the same person, yet you always remain the same?"

"'S complicated." Rose said with a grin. "Just promise me you won't consume for a few days, yeah?" She asked the girl, feeling Donna's eyes on her from the doorway. Evelina seemed to consider the request before nodding. "Now, when he gets back, the one I arrived with, I'm going to see if he can do something to fix you."

"If you must," She said. "But it is the mark of the gods, a sign that I am blessed." Evelina partly protested.

"Face like yours is proof your blessed enough," Rose countered, and Evelina ducked her head and chuckled.

"You are too kind." She said, studying Rose's eyes. "The kind wolf, defender of the Earth."

Rose's breath caught, and her mouth started to move without sound but was cut off from possibly making any as the whole house shook and a deep, screeching noise echoed down the hall.

"What the?" Rose stood, glancing at Donna who paled and looked over her shoulder.

Rose darted down the hall, hearing Donna and Evelina following close behind.

She thought she heard the Doctor shouting at Metella, possibly some servants, something about being followed.

"What the bloody hell has he gone and done this time?" Rose growled, picking up speed and entering the room where she had been with him and the other one before.

He looked at her from across the room in wide-eyed terror, the hypocaust between them suddenly losing it's grill. A large, rock hand grabbed the side, and it was followed by the rest of a rock monster pulling itself up.

"The gods are with us," Rose heard Evelina murmur behind her, but as the monster turned its gaze on Rose for a moment he was pretty much one hundred percent certain it was not a god at all. Then again, she'd faced off with the devil, so that one percent ….

"Water!" The Doctor shouted. "We need water! All of you, get water." The Doctor shouted, and Rose almost sprung into action with Donna, Quintas, and a few servants when she noted one stopped and stared at the thing. A moment later, the Rock Beast blew fire on the servant, turning it to dust, and the Doctor stepped between Metella and the thing.

"Talk to me, that's all I want." He said.

Fight. Fight was nagging at Rose in the way she hated, feral and fierce.

"Talk to me, you just tell me what you are." The Doctor tried to negotiate, and the second the thing stepped toward him she moved. It happened without her even thinking much of the movement: she raced across the room and stood as tall as she could make herself between the thing and her partner.

It's hot, glowing eyes bore into hers. While her heart hammered hard, breathing growing panicked as sweat coated her skin, she stood firm. Flight nagged at the back of her mind, but fight was still more dominate and every inch it shifted them backward she grew more frantic and determined.

Water was poured over the thing from behind, and with a sizzle the hot eyes went out, and the whole body collapsed on the floor in a crumbled pile of rock.

Rose let out a sigh, stepping around and examining the still warm pile. "What was it?" She asked the Doctor.

"Carapice of stone, held together by internal magma. Not too, difficult to stop, but I reckon that's just the foot soldier."

"Oh, great, so there's more and their bigger and smarter." Rose huffed again, looking between the Doctor and the pile of rock, noting Metella behind him looking worried and scared.

"Doctor, or who ever you are, you bring bad luck on this house." Metella said as Evelina moved around to stand by her. The Daughter hugged her mother in a gesture of reassurance, but didn't look at all convinced that what she said was true.

"He just saved your life." Rose said, looking at Metella with disbelief. "He knew how to stop it, and while your brilliant son got what was needed he put our lives at risk actin' as a shield for ya." She ranted, much to Metella's surprise. "Not to mention that that thing was beneath your house long before we got here, waiting for the chance to strike. Look at your daughter's arm, look at the rock, they're the same. Really think the Doctor brings bad luck?"

Metella scowled, looking indignant and ready to say something when Quintas said, "She's right." He headed to Evelina, unravelling the bandage and pulling her arm into the light. "Same thing. Stone, just like Lucius."

"Though not quite as bad." The Doctor noted, gently reaching out and taking Evelina's arm and looking it over. "Lucius's whole right arm was turned to stone, snapped the whole thing right off. This is just starting."

"Rose suggested I not consume for a few days."

"She's clever, that one." He said to Evelina. He then let go of her arm and turned on the balls of his feet toward Rose. "But now I want to know what's messing with events. People breathing in dust and turning to stone. Aliens crawling out of heat vents. I mean, really it's a good thing we stayed." He looked about. "Wait, where's Donna?"

Rose noticed Evelina ducking her head. "I believe she's been taken by the sisterhood." She said meekly. "She spoke false prophecy, and therefore has to be punished."

Rose looked to the Doctor as he looked back at her. "Oh that can't be good." He said.

"For the Sisterhood or for Donna?" Rose asked.

"In the end, probably both." He said. "Come on, we have to find her."

"Look into my mind and see the temple." Evelina said suddenly. "I know you can do such things, it will give you time."

With a quick nod, the Doctor reached out and put his hands on Evelina's temples. She closed her eyes as he did for those fleeting seconds they were in contact.

"Thank you, Evelina." He said quickly as he turned away, taking Rose's hand and showing her the way as they ran.

* * *

 

Of all the adventures Donna Noble ever imagined while she stared off into space at what ever temp job she happened to have, never once did she think one of them would lead to her being kidnapped. And tied to a stone bed. And not a single, attractive man in sight to make it better. The knife one of these sister-people clutched wasn't very reassuring either.

"You've got to be kidding me." She said out loud when repeating it in her head was getting really, really old.

"The False Prophet will surrender both her blood and breath."

"I'll surrender something in a minute." She snapped as the woman with the knife came closer. "Don't you dare." She warned with as much fierceness as she could muster.

"You will be silent." She warned Donna, but the fiery ginger merely snickered.

"Listen, sister, you might have eyes on the back of your hands, but you'll have eyes in the back of your head by the time I've finished with you! Now, Let. Me. Go." She warned, struggling against her bindings.

"This prattling voice will cease forever," The stupid sooth-something said as she raised the blade above her head.

"Oh, that'll be the day." The Doctor's voice came from somewhere off to the side, and relief flood Donna. Spaceman! Of course he'd come through, always does.

The assembled sisterhood turned toward him. "No man is allowed to enter the Temple of Sibyl," Knife wielding psycho bitch said.

"'S alright," Rose's voice came smoothly. "He's only here for the heavy lifting anyway." And Donna glimpsed the skirt of Rose's purple dress through the girls surrounding her. "Now, are we really going to be dramatic over a difference of opinion?" She asked as she stopped in front of the girls. The Doctor moved closer to Donna, and knife wielder turned as if to strike him.

"Oh, I wouldn't…." The Doctor started to warn, but Rose already grabbed psycho's wrist, pulling the hand holding the knife back. Psycho screamed in a mix of pain and panic, dropping the knife to which Rose plucked up quickly. "Sorry, truly, she's a little over protective. Can't be helped. Still, tried to warn you." He said with a sigh before looking down at Donna with a grin. "You alright?"

"Oh, never better." Donna said sincerely.

"I like the toga." The Doctor complimented casually.

"Thank you," Donna replied conversationally. "And the ropes?"

"Not so much." He said, pulling out his sonic screwdriver and pointing it at the ropes. She wasn't quite sure how it was a screwdriver, exactly, but whatever. She wasn't about to dwell on the difference between Earth screwdrivers and non-Earth screwdrivers at a time like this.

She stood up, straightening her toga and smiling at Rose who still held the knife as well as the wrist of it's former wielder.

"Hey you," Donna said with a grin.

"Hey," Rose grinned. "Had a nice stay?"

"Coulda been better, probably wouldn't come again." Donna said with a shrug and head shake, and Rose smiled at her with her tongue between her teeth.

"You mock us in our home with magic and words." The psycho in Rose's grip said, and as she struggled a bit, Donna noticed the others weren't sure if they should stay where they were or try to overpower them. "If the Sibyl were here …."

"Let me tell you about the Sibyl." The Doctor said, starting to move among the assembled with his hands in his pant pockets. "She was a hell of a woman. She could dance the Tarantella, let me tell you. Lovely woman, nice teeth, probably fancied me. And you know what she would think of you all right now? She'd be ashamed, all her wisdom and insight turned sour. She wouldn't have stood for this, and yet here you are spreading the word on the blade of a knife."

"You know nothing!" Spat the psycho, and Donna tried her very best, and mostly succeeded, at not scoffing outwardly.

"Show me this man," A creaky sounding voice said from the shadows, possibly from that figure hidden behind the currents that Donna had thought was a statue.

Ever single red-hooded woman in the room turned toward it and knelt. Well, except psycho, but Rose had a pretty good grip on the woman's wrist.

"High Priestess," Psycho said. "The stranger would defile us."

"Let me see," The voice insisted. "This one is different. He and his mate carry starlight in their wake."

The Doctor stepped toward it, and after a glance at Rose, Donna followed. It would seem She was going to maintain her grip on the psycho, probably not trusting she wouldn't do anything.

"Oh very perceptive," The Doctor said as they approached. "Where do these words of wisdom come from?" He asked.

"The Gods whisper to me," The thing Donna had been so sure was a statue replied, it's head moving.

"They've done more than that," The Doctor said with certainty. "Might I beg an audience? Look upon the High Priestess?"

"Very well," It said, and the curtains surrounding it were drawn back.

Yep, statue alright. A living, breathing, creepy looking statue that looked at the Doctor with eyes that didn't seem to be there. A statue that Donna knew deep in her gut was actually a woman.

"What's happened to you?" She managed to ask.

"The heavens have blessed me." She replied.

"After consuming, yeah?" Rose asked from behind them, but it didn't sound like she'd come any closer.

The statue woman, the high priestess, nodded in Rose's direction.

"May I?" The Doctor asked, reaching toward the High Priestess. She nodded, and took her hand, gently running his hand over the top of it. "Does it hurt?" He asked, seeming to know the answer already.

"It is necessary." She replied. "The gods have so decreed."

"Is that what's gonna happen to Evelina?" Donna asked him. "To all of you," She asked the collective behind her.

Psycho pulled her arm from Rose's grip, and in doing to managed to show that her arm was worse than the teenage girl's had been. "The blessings are manifold." She said.

Donna gapped. "You're stone."

"Exactly." The Doctor said. "The people of Pompeii are turning to stone before the volcano erupts."

"Because they're breathing in the rock from the mountain," Rose answered Donna's unspoken question. "Consuming it along with the vapors." She added, and Donna recalled the way Rose had sort of explained it to Evelina.

"This word, this image in your minds," The High Priestess said curiously. "This Volcano, what is it?"

"More to the point, why don't you know about it?" The Doctor asked. "Who are you?"

"I'm the High Priestess of the Sibylline," She replied.

"No, no, no, I'm talking to the creature inside you. The thing that's seeding itself into a human body. What are you turning it into?"

"Your knowledge is impossible." She replied.

"Oh, but you can read my mind, you know it's not." He replied, and Donna took a hesitant step back as she saw that dark look starting to bloom in his eyes. She glanced back at Rose, but found she wasn't much more comfort. Her eyes didn't really darken but get lighter, wilder, the grip on the hilt of the knife white knuckled as she watched the interaction between the Doctor and the High Priestess carefully.  _"Accompanied by your Wolf, your protector, your mate."_ Evelina had said, and Donna was seeing that very clearly in Rose's posture. What on Earth, or anywhere in the Universe, happened that their roles seemed so firmly reversed since she last saw them?

"We are awakening." The High Priestess said in a voice that was entirely different from her own.

The sisterhood started going nuts, chanting and bowing over and over while on their knees.

"Name yourself," The Doctor insisted. "Planet of origin, galactic coordinates. Species designation according to the universal ratification of the Shadow Proclamation."

"We are rising." It repeated.

"What are you?" Rose's voice growled, startling Donna.

"Pyrovile." The Priestess finally spoke, and the sisterhood changed the chant to repeating that one word.

"What's a Pyrovile?" Donna asked, hoping using her voice would calm her down a bit. Didn't work.

"Well, that's a Pyrovile growing inside her. She's a halfway stage." He said as she slowly backed up toward Rose. She followed at a much more rapid pace, instinctively placing herself behind the woman who was younger than her. If she didn't know better, Donna may have called herself a coward. But if either of them could handle themselves with that, that … thing, it was Rose.

"Like a hatchling," Rose half asked, half suggested as the Doctor came to her side. "Baby compared to the thing in the villa."

"Oh yes." He said in confirmation, reaching into his blazer pocket.

"The breath of a Pyrovile will incinerate you, Doctor." It said as it slowly stood up.

Rose shifted in front of him. "Don't think so." She said, and Donna clutched to the Doctor as he pulled out a … puny, yellow water pistol. A bloody, freakin' water pistol that would barely shoot at something three feet away. Honestly, at least Rose had a real weapon.

"I'm armed. Hurt Rose and I'll shoot!" He said, and Donna bit her tongue as he looked over his shoulder at her. "Donna, get that grill opened." He said, and she glanced around and only noticed one on raised area of the floor twenty feet away. She went for it, watching as Rose and the Doctor moved backward in unison. None of the sisterhood stopped them, or her for that matter. And she went to work on the grill.

The thing was bloody hot. How the hell was she supposed to be able to get it open with out burning her fingers? And it wasn't exactly light. She glanced up, seeing psycho staring at the back of the Doctor's head as he shouted questions at the creature while Rose kept herself between them like a shield.

"What are the Pyrovile doing here?" He shouted as Donna returned to trying to get the grill open.

"We fell from the heavens. We fell so far and so fast, we were rendered into dust."

"Right, creatures of stone shattered on impact. When was that? Seventeen years ago?" He asked, and at the same time Donna tried not to curse the pain in her fingers from the heated metal.

"We have slept beneath for thousands of years." It said.

"So you woke up with the first Earthquake," Rose said. "When the people had to rebuild their homes. They started breathing you in, thinking you're good for'em."

"You heard all that?" The Doctor asked her, and Donna glanced up to see the Doctor had looked to his girlfriend with confusion.

"'Course I did," Rose said, lifting her knife though glancing at it like she knew it was useless but couldn't help herself.

Donna shook her head, looking down at grill and seeing the way that sash part of her toga laid across it. Oh course, how didn't she think of that before? She could use it like a pot holder.

"They offered us their bodies, and we opened their minds. We found such gifts." The alien rock thing said.

"Okay, so you force yourself inside the human brain and use the latent psychic talent to bond. I get that. Rose has some of that, though not from you lot. But seeing the future? That is way beyond psychic. You can see through time, where does that gift of prophecy come from?" He asked just as Donna's pot holder idea enabled her to get the grill off.

"Got it!" She called over to them, and Rose smiled.

"Now get down there!" The Doctor called to her.

She peered inside, only seeing rock and heat waves. "What, down there?" She asked with disbelief.

"Yes, down there." He said to her before looking over at the alien thing again. "Why can't this lot predict a volcano?"

"Sisters!" Psycho yelled out. "I see into his mind, the weapon is harmless."

"To you all, maybe." Rose said as the Doctor shot the water pistol at the alien rocks and it screamed in agony.

Rose moved around, walking backward a few steps as the Doctor ran toward Donna, holding up her knife in warning. It was mostly for psycho, the other sisters rushing to help their priestess alien thing.

"Donna, get down there." The Doctor instructed, and with one last look over her shoulder, Donna leapt in.

The Doctor followed. "You fought her off with a water pistol." Donna said, looking at the alien beside her as Rose hopped down behind them. "I bloody love you."

"Stroke his ego later," Rose said, "We need to move."

"This way," The Doctor said, gesturing ahead.

"Where are we going?" Donna asked as the three of them got to their feet and started moving.

"Into the Volcano." The Doctor replied.

Donna paused, watching the two run head first into likely danger like it was nothing.

"No way." She said, shaking herself out of it and running to catch up.

* * *

 

"But if it's aliens setting off the volcano, doesn't that make it alright for you to stop it?" Donna asked, her voice drenched in hope that may have broken Rose's heart had the circumstances been different.

"Still part of history," The Doctor replied, leading her by hand while glancing at Donna over his shoulder as they weaved their way through the hot interior.

"But I'm history to you. You saved me in 2007, you saved all of us. Why's that different?" She practically begged.

"Because it was different," Rose said, noticing the Doctor had been about to explain before she cut him off. She gave him an apologetic glance before looking at Donna. "Sometimes things so small should never be altered, like when two people meet or … or a nobody sale's man gets hit by a car." She said, feeling the heartbreak and regret coming through from the Doctor. "And sometimes big things can be changed, like ghosts visiting Charles Dickens on Christmas eve, or Witches using Shakespeare to try and take over the world." Rose smirked at the incredulous look Donna gave her. "And sometimes little things can be altered and they have no affect, like where that Sale's man died. And sometimes big things can't be changed, like thousands of people dying because of a Volcano. I'm sorry, Donna. He's not being mean or cruel, he's obeying the laws of time and making sure those who should survive do."

"And how many people won't?" Donna asked, her face softened but her tone still a touch angry. "How many people are going to die today?"

The Doctor inhaled sharply. "Twenty thousand."

"And it has to be all of them, does it Doctor? All twenty thousand?" She challenged, and despite her not wanting to, Rose started to see Donna as a threat.

It was stopped before she could make a move she'd regret by a strange sort of howl in the distance.

"They know we're here, come on!" The Doctor said, waving Donna along while giving Rose's hand a tug.

A little further in and down a small slop, the three of them crouched behind a rock and looked at what reminded Rose of an open plane. Likely a cave of some kind, but what did she know of rock structures? Not a lot, and she didn't feel the need to learn.

"We're in the heart of Vesuvius." The Doctor noted, looking around them. Rose took in the Pyrovile looming in the distance, either ignoring or not noticing them there.

"There's tons of them," Donna noted as the Doctor pulled out a little telescope.

"How many people have already turned to stone?" Rose wondered out loud as she watched the lumbering forms.

"They're all people?" Donna asked, and Rose glanced at her.

"My understanding is that there weren't any natural born Pyrovile left. Turned to dust, yeah? So it would only make sense that these are people who have been consumed by consuming."

"Aren't you clever," The Doctor said, pulling their attention back to him. "I see the carvings inside. That circuit tile? Lucius had others made. They form a panel." He pointed over to an opening that looked kinda like a door. "I think that's how they arrived, or what's left of it."

"Alright, but why do they need the volcano?" Donna asked. "Does it erupt and the launch themselves back into space or something?" She asked.

"How could it be worse?" Donna asked, and Rose was quite curious for the answer herself.

"Heathens!" Lucius's voice actually managed to startle Rose, causing her to grab hold of the Doctor's shoulder and pull him back a bit. She eased slightly as she spotted where the arger was. "They would desecrate your temple My Lord Gods."

A howl behind them hammered into Rose's mind just how trapped they were.

"Better hurry up and think of something, Rocky Four's on its way." Donna noted.

"I vote we had toward the nut case." Rose offered.

"Nut case it is." He said, plucking her hand off his shoulder, reaching back for Donna's and darted across the cave with the two of them in tow.

"Crush them, burn them!" Lucius cries out as a Pyrovile comes from the rocks.

Dropping her hand, Rose watched the Doctor whip out his water pistol and shoot the thing. Maybe he killed, maybe only injured it, but the rock alien cried out and started to fall as Rose felt her hand being plucked up and the Doctor pulled her along with Donna toward the ship.

"There's nowhere to run," Lucius warned them. "This will be where the wolf stops chasing the storm."

Rose turned sharply around as they stood in the ships open door, placing herself firmly in front of the Doctor. "You think so, Ugly? How ya gonna do that? One arm, you're pretty much useless in a fight now, what are you possibly going to benefit from being turned to stone?" She challenged, and a disgusting, happy looking sneer spread over his face.

"The Pyrovile will rise, follow the example of Rome itself and build an almighty empire. We will take over this world and make it in the image of Pyrovillia."

"But you've got all of this technology, why don't you just go home?" Donna asked, and the Doctor and Rose exchanged a quick glance.

"The Heaven of Pyrovillia is gone." Lucius replied.

"What do you mean, 'gone'?" The Doctor asked like Lucius was an idiot. "Where's it gone?"

"It was taken," Lucius replied. "Pyrovillia is lost. But there's enough heat in this world for a new species to rise."

"Yeah, should warn you, it's seventy percent water out there." The Doctor retorted, putting a hand one Rose's shoulder. " _Follow me backward_ ," He said in her mind, and she gave him a very slight nod as she took a step back.

"Water can boil. Everything will burn, Doctor." Lucius sneered gleefully.

"Then the whole planet is at stake. Thank you, it's all we needed to know." The Doctor said, pulling Rose backward with him before he he pulled out his sonic and sealed the doors to the ship shut behind them.

"Bunch of aliens out there wanting to kill us, sealed behind a metal door with no other way out. Yeah, doesn't seem familiar at all." Rose said, feeling that clammy dampness that coated her skin start to increase. "We gonna blow up the mountain and hope we survive?" She asked the Doctor.

"Hopefully it won't come to that," He said as he looked over the marble carved circuitry. "Energy converter," He said mostly to himself. "Takes the lava, uses the power to create a fusion matrix." He said, and Rose's mind started putting everything together.

"Turns people to stone things." She said. "And that thing will do it on a larger scale, yeah?"

"It will do it to millions," The Doctor confirmed.

"But can't you change it?" Donna panted, the heat clearly getting to the Ginger as much as it was Rose.

"Course I can," The Doctor replied, and Rose noted the light sheen of sweat starting on his temple. Never a good sign. "But here in lies the problem, why the soothsayers can't see the volcano: there isn't one. Vesuvius is never gonna erupt. The Pyrovile are stealing all its power, and they're gonna use it to take over the world."

"But, "Donna said, looking lost and overwhelmed. "You can change it back, can't you?"

"I can invert the system," The Doctor nodded, his fingers in his hair as he looked between Donna and the circuits. "Set off the volcano, and that stops the Pyrovile problem. But …" He sighed, looking to Rose with helplessness in his eyes. "Pompeii or the World." He said, "I either change history or make it."

"But this is a fixed point," Rose said firmly. "You change it, we dunno what will happen. The volcano has to erupt, there's no other choice."

"If I set the controls, push that lever," he said, gesturing at the various controls around the circuits. "Versuvius explodes with the force of 24 nuclear bombs. Nothing con survive it, certainly not us. History will be righted, Pompeii will fall as it should, but …." He shook his head.

"Never mind us," Donna said, and Rose looked to see her looking down at the Doctor with determined bravery, glancing up at Rose and giving her a small grin.

While the Doctor was looking at Donna, Rose went about setting the controls, her brain working fast and telling her what buttons to push and switches to flip even though it all looked like rock to her on a cursory glance. Even after all these years it was the only part of her modifications she hadn't gotten used to.

"Twenty thousand people, and I'm the one that has to end their lives. I'm the one that makes them burn." He said while Rose wasn't watching him.

"Not you," She said, even and detached though her soul felt like it was twisting in knots.

"Rose, you shouldn't…." He started to say, hand barely touch hers and trying to calm her and comfort her as she pushed the lever that would put everything as it should.

Everything was still for a moment, then the ship launched. The Doctor took hold of Rose, then pulled Donna in between them. The two of them acted as a shield surrounding their friend as their previously stifling prison put the TARDIS's rocking to shame. She had no idea how long they tossed about, but the impact came hard and jarring, Donna and the Doctor both crashing into her. Rose felt something sharp pierce her as the breath got knocked out of her, and the metallic taste of blood entered her mouth.

"Oh no you don't," She heard the Doctor say as she realized she was having the hardest time breathing and and her head was getting light.

"Doctor, what's happening to Rose? There's blood coming out of her mouth. Doctor?" Donna's voice faded as the Doctor barely made it into Rose's field of vision before he blurred and things went black.

"What was it this time?" Rose asked as she came too.

"Lever through your chest," He growled, and Rose realized the Doctor had been carrying her through the streets as people rushed about in panic. "Impact jarred one of the levers loose, and the weight of Donna and I allowed that tiny piece of rock to pierce you through the heart." He looked down at her. "You took longer to come back than usual. Had to tell Donna you passed out." He said, setting her down on her feet and taking her hand. She felt his love, his concern, the relief there always was when she'd come back from the dead, but there was also a lot of aggravation and perhaps anger there.

She glanced around, looking for Donna, seeing the tear stained face looking helplessly at them.

"Why won't they listen?" She said with utter defeat as a woman carried a little boy down toward the beach.

Rose let go of the Doctor and grabbed Donna's hand. "Come on," she said gently, clutching Donna's arm and allowing the older woman to cling to her in return as they followed the Doctor back to Metella's house.

He ran for the TARDIS, not even sparing the three family members huddled against the wall in fear. Donna looked at them, then to Rose, then to the Doctor.

"Come on!" He yelled out the TARDIS, and Donna spared another look at the family before her face contorted and she ran toward the ship, yelling at the Doctor in a pleading voice.

The Doctor.

 _Oh!_  Rose thought, then looked down and met Metella's eye. "Come with me, please. I'm going to take you to your husband."

"What?" Metella asked.

"Just trust me, yeah?"

Metella looked to Evelina who nodded, and then the three of them helped each other to their feet and followed Rose toward the TARDIS. She waved them in first, making sure the Doctor wouldn't leave with out them, then hurried inside and closed the door.

"Rose, what are you doing?" He asked her, panic in his voice and eyes that she ignored as she moved to the coordinate panel on the console.

 _A little help Old Girl?_  She asked the TARDIS mentally, and watched as the location changed but the date did not. Rose threw the switch, and the engines whirred to life.

"Rose," The Doctor came to her side, glancing at the coordinates than looking to her with hurt confusion. "What are you …?"

She glanced up at him, giving him a small smile and put her hand over his. She sent him images of their conversation with his older self, how he mentioned stopping Caecilius and making him stay in one spot. The Doctor's eyes went wide, brightening.

"Oh," he said as the ship came to shuddering stop.

She chuckled, biting her lip before stepping away and waving to awestruck family to come along.

When Rose opened the door she noticed they were in a small tavern with no one there but the older Doctor and a middle aged bloke who looked utterly distraught until Metella and the kids walked out.

"Caecilius!" Metella exclaimed as she ran into his open arms, clutching to her husband as the kids joined them.

"'Bout time you showed up. Was starting to worry I'd fade away." The Older Doctor said as the Doctor and Donna stood in the doors behind her.

"What have I said about the insults?" Rose asked him, and he merely grinned.

Before anyone else could say anything, the familiar sound of the TARDIS echoed around them, and Rose looked behind her as Donna glanced back at their time ship in panic. She turned as Rose did just as the other TARDIS materialized.

It looked a little different. Newer, maybe, and there was an ambulance seal that hadn't been there before, though Rose didn't get to look at it much before the door it was on swung open and she stepped out.

Well, another version of her.

Older Rose looked at her first, a shadow of a grin on her face before she looked to the suit wearing Doctor than dropped her gaze to the older looking one. "Learned your lesson yet?" She asked him.

"If I said 'yes' am I able to come home?" He asked her.

"Yes, but because I know you're lying out your ass you're sleeping in the library for a week." She retorted, folding her arms and leaning against the door frame of the other TARDIS.

"I said I was sorry," He said with exasperation, dragging himself up from the table and turning toward his wife. "I am, truly. And I will do what ever it takes to make it up to Clara too, but please can we just move on already."

"Fine," Older Rose relented with an eye roll as the older Doctor came up to the TARDIS. She eyed him with a displeasure he seemed to know was false, smiling a tiny bit and not resisting him in the least as he leaned in and kissed her softly.

"I need to change. A week of wearing a toga is a bit too much."

"Don't change too quickly," Older Rose called after him as he stepped inside, shaking her head at something he said but couldn't be heard by the others. She then looked to Rose. "Enjoy that one while you can, he's one of the easier models to deal with." She said with a wink at the Doctor before closing the doors. A beat later the other TARDIS disappeared.

"Oh," The Doctor said. "Memories are already going a tiny bit fuzzy. I think you looked pretty good for a thousand years old, don't you?" He asked Rose as she turned and headed back inside the TARDIS with he and Donna. It would seem the family was a touch too focused on their happy reunion to have noticed what was going on, and as much as Rose wanted to say goodbye she had an inkling that there were more important things to discuss.

No sooner were the doors closed and the Doctor was putting the ship in the Vortex did Donna whirl around to Rose and half yelled, "That was you?"

"Yep." Rose said.

"And he said you were over a thousand years old." She said, pointing to the doors as if the older Rose was still outside.

"Uh huh." Rose nodded. "That's what the other Doctor said, anyway."

"So he's you," Donna said, turning toward the Doctor as he walked toward them his hands in his pant pockets. "Blimey you don't age well."

"Oi," He said, brow furrowing. "I'll have you know that that, Donna Noble, was not  _this_  body. I'm much more handsome than he is."

Donna stared at him, blinking. "Not this body? What the bloody hell do you mean by that? Are you some sorta parasite? Do you latch on to people and invade them like they do in the movies?" She asked, voice going louder as she backed away.

"No, no, no, no, that was still me." The Doctor said, looking to Rose for help. "Blimey, never thought we'd have this discussion so early on."

"What discussion? Rose, what does he do?"

Rose sighed, "He can cheat death by changing his body," She said simply. "If he's really badly hurt he goes through this thing called regeneration. Sorta rewrites him." She shrugged. "I have pictures of his other self if you wanna see."

Donna looked between the two of them. "You change your body to cheat death?" She asked, and the Doctor shrugged and nodded. "Well isn't that wizard." She said, shaking her head, seeming to let it roll off her shoulders. "Alright, I'm exhausted, and sweaty. I need a shower, and sleep." She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. "Thank you, both of you, for saving at least one family."

"Did what we could." Rose said with a shrug, and Donna smiled.

"No," She said gently. "You did more than you should've." She turned around. "You're showing me some pictures of Spaceman in another body at some point. Gotta see what other daft faces he's supposedly had"

"Absolutely," Rose said with a grin that faded when Donna disappeared.

She felt the Doctor's hands on her shoulders, his worry for her coming through stronger than anything.

"I'm fine," She lied.

"I know," He let her.

"It had to be done." She said.

"But not by you." He countered.

Rose turned, looking him in the eye. "I changed to be with you, protect you, be your equal as best I could. You've had to make that call enough times with out anyone willing to do it for you. I could see how much it tore you apart, I couldn't let that happen."

He looked like he wanted to say so many things, and the emotions coming through their skin contact was a jumbled mix, a perfect balance of positive and negative.

"Next time," he sighed, settling on acceptance, "We do it together. Properly together. If we have to be part of fixed events, and we have to make a call that big again, we do it as one."

"Okay," She agreed.

"Okay," he said with a nod, leaning in and kissing her long and tenderly. "I think Donna's on to something with that shower. I'm a Time Lord and even I'm sweating. I'm not supposed to sweat, I'm supposed to be …."

"Would the superior being want company in said shower?" Rose asked, silencing his ranting.

They both knew what was really happening. Both knew he was rambling as to avoid talking about what affect the day could have been having on Rose, and she was well aware asking to join him was her way of proving she was alright even if a part of her was reeling over the choice she made.

But he played along, smiling as seductively as he could and getting Rose to laugh at how badly he pulled it off. But the funny thing is, she realized that she really wasn't as guilty about it. Not in a cold way. She mourned that city, but she understood it had to happen. Fixed points had to happen, sometimes it's something small like a salesmen who was hit by a car, and sometimes it's big like it was today. No matter how badly she wanted things to be different, Rose knew they couldn't be. And in this particular instance there was no point dwelling.

So when the Doctor took her hand, looked her in the eye and said, "Allons-y," with a twitch of his eyebrows she let him lead her out of the room. She allowed herself to let it go. She allowed herself a moment of bliss that she often felt she didn't deserve, and loved every second of it.


	6. Planet of the Ood pt 1

The hand was glowing. A lot. Rose could count a pulse of gold light every two to five minutes, and it was making her unsettled. She studied it from her perch on the jumpseat, clutching a mug of tea close to her chest as she considered what might be happening. But super mind or not, she couldn't come up with an explanation. And since she had to make the call anyway, a little inquiry couldn't hurt.

Pulling her cell phone out, she hit her second speed dial and hoped the TARDIS could somehow set it to a proper point in time.

"Hello, gorgeous." Jack's voice came through the line. "Everything alright?"

"Oh, you know, the usual. Running here and there, getting impaled on a lever." She said with a shrug, the casual way they started mention how they recently died easing the normal awkwardness that would come about with the topic.

"Ouch," he said, the grimace in his voice. "That one had to hurt."

"Didn't really notice, actually." Rose said with a shrug. "And speakin' of noticing stuff, the Doctor's hand. Did it ever, I dunno, glow?" She asked him, watching as it flickered again.

"No," He said, drawing out the word. "Why, is it glowing now?" he asked.

"Yeah, except it seems like the Doctor never notices it. 'N' if he does he's ignoring it."

"Maybe it's something to do with exposure to the vortex?" Jack offered as an explanation. "How long has it been for you two?"

It wasn't a 'how long since I've seen you' question. The beauty of Jack was he completely understood the time lines. He did, after all, act a bit like a guardian angel to her as she grew up, though she knew she'd never really saw him. It was 'how long since the year that never was'? It was a point of reference they agreed was best to measure time against though they never talked about what actually happened.

"How long has it been for you?" She countered, knowing well that it was much longer for her simply by the tone of his voice.

"About eight months."

"Five years." She answered him.

"Five years of Time Lord DNA being in the vortex off and on, in the TARDIS? Doesn't seem too far fetched that the hand is being affected somehow."

"Question is how?" She said, the hand glowing brighter for a moment.

"Morning," Rose heard Donna half sing as she walked into the control room. "Where's spaceman?"

"Who's that?" Jack asked, his voice dripping with the urge to flirt.

"That's Donna," She said, smiling and waving at Donna who must have only just noticed the phone in Rose's hand. "She's justed started traveling with us."

"You two took on a companion?" He asked, the surprise over powering his flirtatiousness. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's the first time since Martha."

"Yeah, it is." She said, covering the mouth piece partially. "Morning, Donna. The Doctor is either in the galley or the library." She replied to the woman on the ship, but just as she was about to head back down the corridor the Doctor appeared with a grin. "Listen, Jack, I think I have to go."

"Yeah, me too." He said.

"Say hi to Ianto for me, yeah?" She teased, hearing his laughter on the other end.

"Will do. Love you, Rosie."

"Back at ya, Jack." She said before ending her call and looking up to see the Doctor and Donna coming over to her. "So where are we going today?" She asked before swallowing the last bit of her tea.

"Where ever you went to get that phone," Donna said, pointing at the device Rose sat on the jumpseat. "May not want to talk to my mother often, but it'd be nice to give Granddad a ring once in a while."

"Oh, well, here, you must have a phone on you." The Doctor said, reaching out toward Donna.

She looked at him suspiciously before pulling out her device and handing it to the Doctor. He popped off the back, and went about his work of making it just a touch more super.

"Did you ever replace Martha's?" Rose asked.

The Doctor glanced up at her. "Yeah." He said. "Put your number in the new one before I left it on her doorstep."

"You didn't even go in to say hi?" She asked him as he finished up with Donna's cell and handed it back to her.

He put his hands in his pockets. "No," He said, looking up and meeting her gaze. "I went while you were visiting Jack, landed the day after we dropped the Jones's off. May have been a year for us, but for her…."

"What did you do to my cell?" Donna asked with amazement.

"Oh, that, yeah. Universal roaming. Call anywhere in the universe. Might want to be careful of the bill though."

Rose rolled her eyes. "He says that every time, but you wanna know something? That little jiggery-poke thing he does makes even Earth long distance work like local calls." She ratted him out, and the Doctor pouted and glared.

"Take all the fun out of it." He said, and she grinned with her tongue between her teeth.

"It's the best reception I've ever gotten on this thing." Donna said as she pocketed her cell. "But enough of that, where now?" She asked eagerly.

"Oh, I don't know." The Doctor said as he casually strolled over to the randomizer. "How about we let the Old Girl decide, eh?" He asked, hitting the switch with flourish and sending the ship rocking about.

Donna let out a little scream, but her smile betrayed how much she was loving the ride. Rose held tight to her mug, unwilling to lose this one to a crash against the grating.

"Here we are, mystery tour!" The Doctor exclaimed as the TARDIS landed. "Outside those doors could be any planet, anywhere, anywhen in the whole wide Universe." He said with a manic grin until he noticed how utterly petrified Donna looked. "You alright?" He asked her.

"Terrified." She replied, her voice shaking. "I mean, history's one thing, but an alien planet?"

"They're truly some of the best, promise." Rose encouraged, setting her mug on the grating now that the danger of breaking had subsided. "Can be beautiful and terrifying all at once, but you'll never want to miss it."

"So it's not just me?" Donna asked.

"Course not," The Doctor said. "Why do you think we keep going?"

"Even after all this time?" Donna asked, looking between the two of them.

"Never gets old." Rose vowed, and Donna's whole demeanor changed to excitement.

"Alright then! All of us, let's go." She said as she turned to the doors. "Oh this is barmy. I was born in Chiswick, I've only ever done package holidays. And now here I am, this is so … I don't know know what the word is!" She said before darting out the doors.

"Never gets old," The Doctor said eagerly, grabbing his trench coat off the railing and darting out behind her.

Rose giggled, shaking her head and blinked once. The hand glowed again, three times in quick succession, and then stopped. Another blink, and Rose noted her thick leather jacket and a heavy parka laying on the railing.

"Thanks," She said to the ceiling, stroking the nearest coral strut before plucking up her jacket and throwing it on. The TARDIS hummed happily at the acknowledgment as Rose picked up Donna's jacket and headed for the doors. She opened the doors to find Donna just outside, and smiled as she handed the parka to the grateful woman.

Behind Donna was the most breath taking landscape of snow Rose had seen aside from Woman Wept. It was light and fluffy, hardly good for snow balls or play in general, but gorgeous and perfect for walking.

The Doctor turned around to see them both coming toward him.

"Sorry, you were saying?" Donna said as she bundled herself up, throwing the heavy hood over her head. Rose chuckled, reaching in her pockets and pulling out a gray winter hat, followed by a pair of burgundy leather gloves.

"Better?" The Doctor asked Donna as the two women moved to stand on either side of him. Rose took hold of his arm, clutching on to it and looking around him to Donna.

"Lovely, thanks." She said as she buried her hands in her pockets.

"Comfy?" The Doctor teased.

"Yep."

"Can you hear anything inside that?" He asked, craning his head as if he had to look underneath it to see her. Then again with his height, maybe he did.

"Pardon?" Donna said, the smile cracking as she bantered.

"You two going to do this all day?" Rose asked, grinning.

"How're you in just a thin little jacket?" Donna asked as she looked the Doctor up and down. "You've hardly got skin on your bones,"

"Superior Time Lord Biology," Rose replied in sync with the Doctor, her tone mocking while he boasted. He turned to her looking affronted, and she laughed at him. "Don't look at me like that, you had it coming."

"What about you?" Donna asked, and Rose looked to see she was getting a once over from Donna as well. "Better off than he is, but not by much."

Rose shrugged. "Just gotta be comfortable, me. Can't get hypothermia, or frostbite."

"I thought you weren't alien." Donna said suspiciously.

"Remember the huons? How mine were different from yours?" She asked, and Donna nodded. "Well they changed me. Still human just with some modifications. Upgrades here, down grades there."

"So, you're, what? Weather proof?" Donna asked, and Rose grinned.

"Among other things." She said, wondering for a moment if maybe she should tell Donna she actually died in Pompeii.

The rocket flying over head distracted her.

"A rocket. Blimey, a real proper rocket." Donna said in awe as it disappeared over the horizon. "Now that's what I call a spaceship. You've got a box, he's got a Ferrari!" She said to the Doctor, giving him a friendly smack on the chest before darting off in the direction it went. "Come on, let's see where it's going." She called to them.

"The TARDIS is way better than a Ferrari." The Doctor grumbled.

"Yet, you call her a sports car whenever you and Jack get into it about your methods of time travel." She said as they started following Donna.

"That's because a vortex manipulator is nothing, while the TARDIS is a magnificent ship. I'd like to see a rocket take us back a few thousand years." He said, straightening his tie as they walked.

"Oh, hush up, Spaceman, was only teasing." Donna called over her shoulder.

"Don't worry about it, Donna. He's just like any other man, insult his mode of transportation and he gets in a huffle about it."

Donna laughed. "A trait that stays the same across species, eh?" She asked, pausing so they could catch up to her.

"All of time and space, whether it's a horse or a space ship, they always feel their's is the best."

"You love the TARDIS," The Doctor whined.

"I do lover her, she's brilliant."Rose said. "But I don't get all offended when someone points out that the exterior does lack a certain spaceship quality. If you recall, I thought you were barking for hiding in a wooden box when we first met."

"Yeah," He said, entirely distracted and looking about. "Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?" She asked, but he turned to Donna.

"Donna, take your hood down," He said, and the ginger woman promptly did so.

"What?" She asked, looking between him and Rose. Rose merely shrugged.

"That noise, don't you hear it? It's like a song."

Rose strained to hear, but the only sound was the wind. She shook her head, and Donna looked up at the Doctor as Rose did, the two watching him as she looked about.

"This way," He said, running off and slipping out of Rose's grip as he did. She and Donna exchanged another glance before running after him.

"Oh my god," Rose said as the caught up to him, seeing the Doctor kneeling by an Ood. "What happened to him?"

"Looks like he's been shot." The Doctor replied, and Rose rushed to the other side of the Ood.

"Hello," She said softly, "What's your name? Do you have a name?" She asked, stroking his head.

"Designated Ood Delta 50," It replied weakly, lifting it's communicator ball.

"It's face," Donna said softly, and Rose's head shot up. She shook it gently.

"Donna, don't." The Doctor chastised as he pulled out his stethoscope. "He's a he, not an it."

"Sorry," Donna apologized, kneeling by Delta 50's head on the same side as the Doctor. She held his hand, and smiled. "My name's Donna," She offered. "And that's Rose on the other side. And this is the Doctor." She added, and Rose could see that she was on the verge of tears.

"I don't know where the heart is." The Doctor said, defeat in his voice as he looked over to Rose. "I don't know if he's got a heart."

"Are you in pain?" Rose asked Delta 50, and he looked at her and blinked.

"The circle …." He said weakly.

"No, don't try to talk," Donna said soothingly.

"The circle must be broken," Delta 50 said, looking Rose in the eye.

She felt something then, thought she heard the faint trace of something in her mind as the Doctor tried to ask the poor Ood questions.

It happened quickly: Delta 50 blinked, and when his lids opened his eyes were red. Rose let go of him, leaning over the Ood and shoving the Doctor and Donna back just before the Ood bolted up and roared. The force sent her tumbling into the snow, where she rolled a couple time before stopping herself and getting on her hands and knees, ready to launch herself into the Ood if he seemed like a threat to the Doctor or Donna. Just as quickly as he shot up, the Ood collapsed, eyes closed.

"He's gone," Donna said, and Rose moved back to the Ood's side.

"I thought he was going to attack," She said weakly, feeling too terrible to even reach out and touch him as Donna started stroking the Ood's head. "All I could think of was Krop Tor."

"It's alright," The Doctor assured her. "You didn't hurt him."

"What do we do? Do we bury him?" Donna asked, looking between the Doctor and Rose.

The former stood, looking around. "Snow will take care of that," He said as he reached down and offered both women a hand.

"So, what's an Ood?" Donna asked as she brushed the snow from her pants.

"They're servants to humans in the forty-second century. Mildly telepathic. That was the song, his mind calling out." The Doctor explained.

"Couldn't hear anything," Donna admitted with a shake of her head.

The Doctor looked hopeful at Rose. "Sorry," she said, shaking her head.

"He sang as he was dying?" Donna asked, looking down at the lifeless Ood.

"Suppose so," Rose said, feeling sympathy for the poor thing. "They're quite lovely creatures when they're not being possessed or … what ever that was."

"His eyes turned red." The Doctor said.

"Were red when they were chasing me down a ventilation shaft, too." Rose replied. "Why'd ya think I was so quick to shove you two out of the way?"

"And what did it mean when they turned red?" Donna asked.

"Meant they turned aggressive." Rose replied.

"And for a docile race, that means trouble." The Doctor said, gesturing with his head for them to continue in the direction of the rocket.

"So you two encountered them before?" Donna asked.

"Yeah," Rose replied, falling back slightly from the Doctor to fall in step with Donna. "Honestly, Oods are normally just there, willing to help. People we encountered claimed they wanted to be servants, but I think it's just that they're kind and want to help." She paused, "Well, unless they become possessed and want to kill ya."

"Last time we met them there was a, uh, force." The Doctor said, carefully avoiding the actual name of the force. "A stronger mind that over took them."

"What sorta force?" Donna asked.

"Oh, you know, it was a force. Long story." He said as if it were a casual brush off.

"Long walk." She countered.

"It was the Devil," The Doctor said, stopping a second for them to catch up.

Donna stopped, looking over to Rose. "He's joking."

Rose shrugged. "Only partly. Wasn't a very good Devil, though. Got a few things wrong," She said as they continued on.

"Oh?" Donna asked. "How's that?"

"Said it was going to die in battle," Rose replied.

"Obviously that was off." Donna scoffed.

"Yeah," Rose said. "It was actually closer to a dozen times." She said casually. She thought about that moment off and on over the years, almost always when she thought of the Master. The valiant child wasn't meant to be taken as she'd die  _on_  the Valiant, but she couldn't help but find the coincidence that she died on the ship not once, but twice.

She expected Donna to say something, but every time she looked at the ginger over her shoulder she just seemed to be thinking really hard. Rose glanced up at the Doctor who either didn't notice the casual way she mentioned her deaths or was pointedly ignoring it.

"Look at that!" He cried out as they came climbed over and a round a few rocks. "Civilization! Come on, let's go do some poking around."

* * *

 

If there was one thing Donna could get used to it was this psychic paper business. By the time they'd caught up with the small crowd forming outside, she was wondering if that paper could be used to get them into some kind of luxury resort.  _It couldn't hurt to try it sometime,_ she thought.  _Give those two time to do what ever freaky things aliens do in those situations._  She tried not to think about it too much.

"Sorry, sorry we're late. Don't mind us, hello." The Doctor greeted as they made their way through the crowd.

"And you would be?" A prissy looking little thing asked with a strained politeness that Donna was all too familiar with. Doesn't matter where in the Universe she was, the posh office types were everywhere.

"I'm The Doctor, this is my partner Rose Tyler, and this is Donna Noble." He said, flashing the paper.

And Donna couldn't resist. "Representing the Noble Corporation PLC Limited, Intergalactic." She said, glancing at the paper and seeing that what she had said was instantly added on.

"Must have fallen off my list, my apologies. Won't happen again." Miss Priss said, handing each of them a folder from the pile in tucked under her arm. "Here are your information packs, vouchers are inside. Now, if you'd all like to come with me, the Executive suites are nice and warm." She said, starting to wave them along when a loud alarm went off.

"What's that?" Rose asked.

"Oh, it's just a siren," Miss Priss covered stupidly. What else could it have possibly been? "End of the work shift. Now, this way, quick as you can." She said, beckoning them once more.

Donna glanced at the pair, and knew instantly her instincts were right. What ever that was, it was a sign of the trouble they had been looking for.

They were lead inside, down a small corridor and into a larger room where there were a few Oods hanging around the outskirts. "As you can see," Priss said as she went about the dance of getting buyers, one that Donna had seen so many times with different agencies that she probably could have gone up there and done it herself. "The Ood are happy to serve, and we keep them in facilities of the highest standard. Here at the Double O, that's Ood Operations," Priss said as if it was an insider's secret, and Donna rolled her eyes. She caught Rose doing the same thing, and the two of them exchanged a slight smirk before going back to pretending they were listening. "We like to think of the Ood as our trusted friends. We keep the Ood health, safe, and educated. We don't just breed the Ood, we make them better. Because at heart, what is an Ood but a reflection of us? If your Ood is happy, then you'll be happy too."

"'Splains why I'm not the least bit happy then," Rose murmured quietly. "Delta 50's dead. Couldn't've been too happy if he was out in they snow bleeding to death." She added quietly as Priss moved to stand next to three Oods who waited side by side.

"We've introduced a variety package with the Ood translator ball. You can now have the standard setting." Priss turned to the nearest Ood. "How are you today, Ood?"

"I'm perfectly well, thank you." It replied, it's voice truly not distinct from Delta 50. Something about that didn't sit well with Donna, how they were essentially voiceless, lacking of distinction.

"Or perhaps, after a stressful day, a little something for the gentlemen." Priss continued to the next Ood, and Donna arched a brow. "And how are you, Ood?" Priss asked.

"All the better for seeing you," The Ood replied in what had to be the typical male fantasy voice of a woman.

"You've got to be kidding me." Rose mumbled quietly.

"What? That's not how you greet Spaceman after a long day?" Donna asked quietly, trying not to smile.

"Not even in his dreams." Rose replied, and the Doctor, snorted a chuckle and shook his head.

Donna grinned, paying attention only in time to hear the Ood mimic that stupid, brash, yellow American cartoon character that was so inexplicably popular.

It was the end of the song and dance, and with a simple wave of the hand the group, made up pretty much entirely of men, dispersed to the food and drink. The Doctor and Rose turned immediately to a little computer sort of thing, and with a quick few flicks from the Doctor a picture of what Donna would guess was a solar system popped up.

"Oh, look, it's the Ood-Sphere. I've been to this solar system before, ages ago." The Doctor said with a touch of nostalgia to his excitement.

"How many ages?" Rose asked casually.

"I was with Susan," He replied, more focused on the image than his girlfriend. It made Donna instantly wonder who Susan was. Couldn't have been anyone too bad if the sad smile on Rose's face was any indication. Still, another thing for Donna to file away and ask about another time. "It's the year 4126," The Doctor continued, a bit more lively again. "The second Great and Bountiful Human Empire."

"4126?" Donna said, gapping between the two of them. "It's 4126?"

"It's good, isn't it?" The Doctor asked, looking at the image again.

"What's the Earth like now?" Donna asked, trying to wrap her head around the fact that she was in the future. Donna Noble, in the future.

"Bit full. But you see, the Empire stretches out across three galaxies." The Doctor explained, looking over his shoulder to Donna.

"And our lot keep going," Rose added. "We explore quite far into the stars. And we mingle a bit, apparently. Do some things that would make the people of our time uncomfortable."

"Like shackin' up with other species?" Donna teased her, and Rose grinned.

"Also've been known to get 'enhancements'." Rose said, complete with air quotes. "We've met a woman a coupla times that was so nipped and tucked she was just a flappa skin."

"Seriously?" Donna asked, and Rose nodded. "How was she alive?"

"Honestly, the two of you?" The Doctor said over his shoulder. "Over two-thousand years into your futures and you get Donna all focused on shagging and surgery."

"Not really my future anymore though, is it?" Rose countered. "Maybe after I was born, but seeing as how I'll be living out the rest of our lives on a time machine."

"But wait," Donna interrupted, "You said the Earth got full? So we spread out but we don't leave? Does that mean all that stuff about Global Warming, and flooding, and not having long to live is rubbish?"

"Well, your planet is heating up from all the pollutants, which would cause flooding eventually, but the Earth rights itself and you lot get your act together eventually." Another screen popped up, this time with blinking red dots.

"What're those?" She asked, pointing at the dots.

"Ood distribution centers." The Doctor said with a touch of disapproval to his voice.

"Across three galaxies?" Donna asked, looking between the couple, and the screen. "Don't the Ood get a say in this?"

"I've tried asking before," Rose replied. "They just keep saying they live to serve. But this is another time, a little further into the future. Maybe the Ood started to change their minds."

"Maybe they have," Donna said with a shrug, turning around and heading straight for the nearest Ood. She still wasn't used to the face, or the eyes, or the alieness of him. Not like she hadn't seen enough aliens already, but this one was so much more … alien. She cleared her throat. "Um, sorry." He ignored her. Typical man, didn't matter the species. Still, maybe he just didn't think she was talking to him. As it was, a quick glance around the room showed no one speaking to the Ood, barely acknowledging them as the creatures handed them things. She hesitated, eventually tapping the Ood's shoulder. "Hello," She smiled, "Tell me, are you all like this?"

"I do not understand, Miss." He said politely.

It caught her off guard. Been a while since anyone called her that. "Why do you say 'miss', do I look single?" She asked. She'd settle for looking single, though she wouldn't complain if he said young.

"Back to the point," The Doctor said in her ear.

"Right. Are there any free Ood? Are there Ood running while somewhere?"

"All Ood are born to serve. Otherwise, we would die." He replied. Donna thought she heard Rose mumble something about dying anyway.

"But you can't have started like this," Donna tried to reason with the gentle alien. "Before humans, what were you like?"

The Ood looked at her in confusion, blinking once. "The Circle."

"What?" Rose asked, moving swiftly to stand by Donna.

The hairs on her neck and arms stood on end, and Donna wasn't sure if it was from the way the Ood looked at them, or the vibes coming off of Rose beside her.

"The circ … the circle … is …" But before the Ood could finish, Miss Priss called the Oods back to to their stations, and the one she was talking to obeyed without a second thought.

"That … that wasn't offensive." Rose said with a touch of shame to her voice. The Doctor came up behind her, gripping her shoulders tightly, and Rose's hands immediately fell on his. Her brow furrowed a moment, and then the Doctor placed his forehead against her hair. "He wasn't attacking. He wasn't going to hurt anyone."

"It's okay," the Doctor said softly. "You reacted on instinct."

"No," Rose shook her head. "I react on fear and experience. I know that Ood are good, but…." She didn't finish the sentence, and the Doctor didn't press her. He placed a kiss on the back of her hair and then turned to Donna. "I think we've had enough schmoozing. Fancy going off the beaten track?"

Donna grinned, glancing at Rose to see the younger looking woman seemed to have collected herself for the most part, and then met the Doctor's eye. "Rough guide to the Ood-Sphere? Works for me."

* * *

 

They ventured outside, off the beaten path as the Doctor put it, and Rose couldn't help but feel both guilty and thankful they did. Seeing the Ood whipped as they crawled in the snow, trying to to keep up with the others and back on his feet after a tumble both broke her heart and enraged her.

"Last time I met the Ood, I never thought. I didn't ask." The Doctor admitted as they watched this disgusting display below.

"Doesn't sound like you," Donna noted.

"I was busy. So busy, I couldn't save them. Had to let the Ood die. Guess I owe them one." He replied.

"Think we both do," Rose admitted.

She flexed her hands at her sides, taking deep breaths and trying desperately not to let Donna see what she'd become capable of.

She had no reason to get defensive in the lounge, the Ood wasn't acting threatening at all. It was absolutely nothing like the encounter on Krop Tor but that stumble on his words, and nightmares of old dredged themselves up from the back of Rose's mind. And the second they came to the surface she had to protect Donna as much as she would the Doctor.

And that added to her fear of losing control. She was protective of Tim Latimer, a young man she and the Doctor had known well and who helped her during the year that never was, but not like this. For whatever reason, Rose was starting to see that she was more protective of Donna than any other friend they'd made since her modifications kicked in. The Doctor would always be a priority, her life depending on him staying alive, but this … this was different.

So she barely said anything, keeping her mind focused and cleared, trying not to let the abuse the Ood were taking get to her.

They followed the map the Doctor had, weaving their way around the facilities when Donna's whistle stopped them short. They turned around, and she smiled, gesturing at a door.

"Where'd you learn to whistle?" The Doctor asked as Rose looked about the warehouse.

"West Ham, every Saturday." Donna replied, and Rose heard him walking away, the whir of the sonic. "Rose?" Donna called, "Ya coming?"

"Actually, no." She said, sticking her hands in her pockets as the Doctor whipped his head up and looked at her with surprise. "'S one way in, I'm gonna see if there's another." She replied, gesturing with her head toward the back.

"You sure?" He asked her, and she could tell that he must have understood she needed the breathing space but the sympathetic smile he flashed.

"Yeah." She said, looking to Donna. "Don't let him do anything too stupid." She said with a wink, turning around and hiding her smile at the Doctor's "oi".

Rose walked around the corner while fishing in her trans dimensional pockets for her map. She hadn't bothered removing her gloves, so she was trying to feel for it without knowing for sure if it was that paper she had in her hands. She cursed her attention span being woefully occupied when she turned the corner and ran straight into someone.

He stumbled, looked a little bewildered, then tensed.

"You're not supposed to be here." He said.

Rose looked him over, seeing the white lab coat under his jacket. "Neither are you." She guessed.

They had a bit of a stand off before he said, "FOTO?"

"FOTO?" She repeated, brow furrowing.

"You're not part of the organization? Friends of the Ood?" He asked, equally suspicious and hopeful.

"Not officially," Rose replied with a smirk. "Could say that I am, though. What is FOTO doing here, then?" She asked, gesturing toward the warehouse.

"I was going to check on the Ood. Make sure they're doing okay." He said, shifting around.

"'S that all the Friends of the Ood do?" She asked, crossing her arms.

He looked around. "I can't tell you what more is going on. If you're part of FOTO, you know. If you're not, then saying anything could, well, I suppose if you were undercover to try and stop me I wouldn't still be talking, would I?" He asked.

"'Suppose not." She grinned. "But I'll tell you what, I won't make you tell me what you're really up so long as you tell me if there's a back way inside that warehouse?" She asked, gesturing to the building.

"Yes," he nodded, "I just came from there, follow me." He said gesturing behind him before turning around. He lead her to the back. "Right through here." He said. "Though I'll warn you, you can get pretty lost when you're inside. All those crates, things start to look the same."

"I'll be alright." She said, and he nodded. Punching in the code on the door, the lock eased and Rose stepped inside.

Inside the warehouse there was a faint, familiar stench in the air. Huddled Ood in captivity, a mix of summertime on the tube and the loo at the Pub on a Saturday night. It wasn't overly strong, but it was enough that Rose could guess what was inside all the containers around the room. Keeping to the edge of the room, straining to hear either the Doctor or Donna through the hum of equipment, she tried to keep out of sight. She had no idea how far she had gotten when the alarm went off, but it was far enough away from the door that she couldn't go back.

Pressing herself against a container, she heard the guards storming inside, but the didn't seem to notice her. Not yet anyway.

She moved as slow as she could, quietly as possible, heading toward a set of stairs as she noticed a few of the guards were heading toward what had to be various exits of the warehouse.

Heart starting to pound, realizing that if they weren't after her they were after  _someone_ , she started to get defensive. High, she needed to get high so she could see where the Doctor and Donna were. She looked up, seeing a crane like in the game over head, the prongs moving as if flexing. The stairs she was heading toward, they likely would get her to the booth where the operator would sit, high enough to see the whole warehouse.

Rose ran.

She felt her gloved fists come in contact with a guard's nose. Felt her hand grip and wrench a gun away before she took the weapon and hit its owner over the head with the butt of it before pushing the same end into the guard she likely punched in the face. She didn't stick around long enough, flying up the stairs.

She could see out the windows and the corner of her eye that the claw was moving, lunging for something every now and then. It wouldn't be that hard to grab a container, so there wasn't any doubt left as to what the claw was after. It made her move faster, two or three steps at a time until she made it to a small corridor. There wasn't anywhere to search, there only being one door at the end, and through the window of the door Rose could see the big, crazy-eyed man sitting at the controls.

She moved, a sort of strut that sent fear into her heart as she recalled it from her nightmares but couldn't stop it. She threw open the door, mildly surprised it wasn't locked. The heavy door slamming against the wall startled him, and he looked up long enough to flash her a vicious grin.

He opened his mouth to say something, but the words never came out. A couple quick punches in the face, hitting his nose and right eye, and then a jab at his pressure point and he was out. Reaching over, she pulled the claw back up roughly, barely wanting to acknowledge how close it came to the Doctor laying on his back on the warehouse floor.

Rose closed her eyes, half slumping against the controls. She slowed her breathing, willing her heart to do the same, and ignored the prickle of tears as she watched him slowly get up just as guards rushed him.

"You," She heard the woman from the presentation in hospitality say from the door, two guards with her. "Come with us." She said easily, and Rose nodded, hands up as she moved toward them. The two guards each grabbed and arm, and they lead her back down to the warehouse.

She had the distinct feeling she was being led somewhere specific, though it didn't matter much where when she rounded the corner and saw the Doctor coming from the opposite side. He beamed when their eyes met.

"Hello, Sweetheart," He said cheerfully, and she couldn't help but return the smile. "Get into much trouble?"

"Not as much as you, apparently." She replied, smiling her tongue between her teeth. "Where's Donna?" She asked, glancing about for their feisty third.

"Doctor! Rose! Get me out! Get me outta here!" Donna's voice came from a container as the guy Rose beat up in the control room came jogging over.

"Oh," The Doctor said, "I see you met Rose. By the way, you should really get our friend out. If you don't you're really in trouble, and I don't think it'll be Rose who'll show you just how much."

"I must be losing my touch," Rose sighed. "He shoulda been out for a little while longer."

The large man shot a glare at Rose, a touch too much appreciation in his eyes to make his sneer seem real as he took a set of keys off the his belt and unlocked the container. It was only now that she was level headed and not blinded by rage that Rose could see that he was the same man they say whipping to Ood earlier. It made her want to punch him a few more times, and that was being kind.

The doors to the container popped open, and a beat later a blue of brown and red rushed toward them. Donna gripped Rose first, then the Doctor in a bone crushing hug.

"There we go, safe and sound," The Doctor grinned as Donna pulled back.

"Never mind me, what about them?" Donna asked, pointing to the container.

From her angle, Rose couldn't see what was going on, but the panic that went through the guards, and the hum of electricity paired with a scream told her what ever it was, wasn't good.


	7. Planet of the Ood pt 2

" _There we go, safe and sound," The Doctor grinned as Donna pulled back._

" _Never mind me, what about them?" Donna asked, pointing to the container._

_From her angle, Rose couldn't see what was going on, but the panic that went through the guards, and the hum of electricity paired with a scream told her what ever it was, wasn't good._

* * *

 

"Red alert! Fire, shoot to kill!" The guy Rose beat the crap out of shouted, and as an Ood emerged she could see why.

Red eyes.

The guards that held her arms let go to deal with the Ood, and the second she was free she grabbed the Doctor and Donna, turned them around, and pushed them toward the door to get them running.

After getting a decent distance away they all stopped, turning and noting the woman who ran the presentation was right behind them panting.

"If people back on Earth knew what was going on here…." Donna growled while catching her breath, staring at the woman who looked terrified for the wrong reasons

"Oh don't be stupid, of course they know." She replied, and Rose could see it was likely only her business oriented thinking that prevented her from rolling her eyes at Donna.

"They know how you treat the Ood?" Donna challenged, and the woman's confidence seemed to waver.

"They don't ask," She replied, "Same thing."

"No it's not," Rose snapped. "People don't ask because you tell them what they want to hear. You said it yourself back at your pathetic presentation. You keep them safe, healthy. Didn't realize being wiped was good for ya. Have you had your daily dose? Would ya like me to crack a few on your back for you?" Rose challenged, watching the woman's eyes flicker between wanting to argue and genuine fear that Rose would do it. And she did see what that brute looked like when she was done with him.

"Rose, it's fine." The Doctor tried to calm her.

"No, it's not. Because if we had been paying attention the first time, non of this would've happened." She whirled around on him, and she saw the flicker of fear in his eyes for a split second.

"You're right, we should have been paying attention, and that's why we need to stop this now. And to do that, we need answers," He said, placing a hand on her shoulder, thumb against her neck, and calming her slightly before looking at the woman. "Solana, the Ood aren't born like this. They can't be. A species born to serve could never evolve in the first place, so what does the company do to make them obey?" He asked the woman, and she seemed to regain her composure as he spoke.

"That's nothing to do with me," She replied defensively, and when Rose whipped her head back toward her she startled.

"'Oh, what, 'cause you don't ask?" The Doctor retorted, and Rose smirked a bit at the frustration that he accidentally let slip through their skin contact.

"That's Doctor Ryder's territory," Solana said as if that explained everything.

"Where is he?" The Doctor asked. "What part of the complex." And when she still seemed hesitant he added. "I can help with the red eye." He said as he pulled his hand away from Rose to retrieve the map from his pocket. "Show me where."

"There," She pointed out quick enough. "Beyond the red section."

"Come with us," he offered. "You've seen the warehouse, you can't agree with all this. You know this place better than us, you could help." He implored.

Rose watched the indecision play on Solona's features for a short time. "They're over here." Solona called out.

It was reactive, the coil snapping in Rose's wound-too-tight body from all that she'd seen and her lack of proper release earlier. Her fist made contact with Solona's perfect nose, and Rose could feel the crack of it before the woman dropped. Her blood was staining the snow as she groaned, not out cold but in too much pain to keep shouting.

"Kinda wanted to do that myself." Donna said as they started to head to the Ood Conversion area.

"Did feel rather good," Rose admitted, getting a chuckle out of Donna as they maneuvered between buildings.

As they moved, avoiding guards as they made their way to where Solana the rat point on the map, Rose watched the Doctor's face contort every once in a while. Just as they approached another door he stopped, smiling a little. "Oh, can you hear it?" He asked, and she and Donna exchanged a look that he didn't notice. "I didn't need the map, I should've listened."

"We can't hear," Rose reminded him as he used the sonic to get them inside. "So what is it?"

He glanced at her as they stepped in, wincing a bit as he soniced the lock. "Oh, my head," He grumbled, trying to shake away whatever was making him hear things.

"What is it?" Donna asked, and he looked between the two of them.

"You really can't hear it? The singing?" He asked, and then he realization came over him. "It's in my head. But, wait, Rose, you should heart this, you're telepathic."

"We already know it's different than yours," She reminded him. "Can't feel you inside my head unless we're touching."

"Take off your gloves." He said, and with nod she did so. When her hands were exposed he reached out and took her fingers in hers, eliciting a gasp.

Tears came to Rose's eyes as the song played in her head, the sad, beautiful melody that came from the heart of one of the most loving, gentlest creatures in the Universe. She turned her head toward the song, holding tight to the Doctor's hand as he lead them to near the back where there was a small cage with six Ood huddled together in a circle, crouched low with their heads bowed.

"It's their song," The Doctor said, more likely for Donna's sake than Rose's for as they got closer the song grew louder.

"They look different to the others," Donna noted.

"That's because they're natural born Ood. Unprocessed, Unspoiled. Before they're adapted to Slavery." The Doctor explained as they got closer to the cage, all three kneeling down so they wouldn't tower over the Ood.

"I can't hear it." Donna said sadly.

"Do you want to?" He asked her.

"Yeah," Donna nodded slightly.

"It's the song of captivity," he cautioned her, and Donna glanced at the Ood.

"Let me hear it," She said.

The Doctor let go of Rose's hand, and the Ood song stopped. As he was giving Donna instructions so he could enter her mind, Rose turned to the Ood. One was looking at her, keeping his hands closed around something close to his body, seeming afraid. Rose held up both her hands, giving him her kindest smile, and then gently touched the back of his head. The song filled her mind so loudly she couldn't hear anything else, and in return she tried to send it apologies, warmth, kindness, anything she could think of that might help these creatures understand how sorry she was for what was being done to them, and how they were going to try to help.

She felt the Doctor's hand on her shoulder, and she slowly with drew her touch from the Ood's head.

She looked up, seeing the pride in his eyes and playing lightly on his lips as he motioned for her to step away. The Ood she had touched watched her as she got to her feet and the Doctor soniced the lock open.

"So you can still hear it?" Donna asked, her voice breaking. "You can still hear the song?"

"All the time," the Doctor replied.

"And you can't?" She asked Rose.

She shook her head. "Just a touch telepath, me. And only with other telepathic beings." She said as the Doctor opened the cage door.

As soon as it was open, a banging started on the warehouse door, startling Donna and putting Rose on edge for a second.

"They're breaking in." Donna warned.

"Ah, let them," The Doctor said, stepping inside the cage.

Instantly the Ood tried to back away, the one Rose came in contact with shooting glances between her and the Doctor. She nodded slightly.

"What are you holding? Show me." The Doctor said to one gently. "Doctor, Rose, Donna, friends. Let me see." He gestured to all of them, miming as best he could.

Rose carefully stepped inside, kneeling next to the one she had contact with. He didn't look so scared of her, but she still showed him her hands before she gently touched him. She tried to convey what the Doctor was asking through their contact, simply showing the Ood it's own hands with curiosity.

He looked to the Doctor, then scooted forward, opening his palms and showing the Doctor the tiny organ.

"What is it?" Rose asked.

"It's a brain," The Doctor replied, and she gently removed her hand from the Ood before she allowed herself to feel the maelstrom of emotions that caused. "A hind brain, the Ood are born with a secondary brain. Like the amygdala in humans, it processes memory and emotions. You get rid of that, you wouldn't be you anymore. You'd be like an Ood, a processed Ood." He explained, and Rose swallowed back the sob as she looked to Donna.

She looked as though she was feeling everything Rose was, and unable to pull her eyes away from the Ood. "So the company cuts off their brains." She said slowly, a bit of the anger coming out in her voice.

"And they stitch on the translator." The Doctor nodded, the storm in his eyes raging as he gritted his teeth with each word.

"Like a lobotomy." Donna compared the two. "I spent all that time look for you, Doctor, because I thought it would be so wonderful out here."

"I'm sorry," Rose said. To Donna, to the Ood she seemed to have bonded with, to the ones she feared and didn't understand all that time ago.

Behind them, the door to the warehouse burst open, and a small army of guards rushed in with guns drawn.

Rose stepped in front of the Doctor and Donna, making sure the Ood were placed behind them as well as the guard relayed their location to someone on the communicator.

The Doctor reached around her pulling the cage door shut and pressing up against Rose and the bars.

"What are you gonna do, then? Arrest us? Lock us up? Throw us in a cage? Well you're too late." He said, sounding half mad. Every brush of his skin against Rose's sent a prickle of fire and rage through her, fueling her own and yet somehow making her less feral.

"We're taking you in," One of the guards said. "All three of you."

"Let them," the Doctor said just as the fight was starting to kick up in Rose. "I wanna see what they possibly think they can do to stop us."

* * *

 

They were handcuffed to pipes. Of all the things that could have been done to them, handcuffed to pipes didn't seem so bad. Tight, would probably break her wrist in the process, but Rose wagered she could probably muster enough strength to break the pipes, or maybe the cuff chain, once they were inevitably left alone of lightly guarded.

"Why don't you just come out and say it," A severely balding man Rose thought she remembered seeing around the compound earlier said to them as he tried to look intimidating. "FOTO activists."

"If that's what Friends of the Ood are trying to prove, then yes." The Doctor replied, his rage ebbed only enough that he didn't look wild in front of the boss man.

"The Ood were nothing without us, just animals roaming around on the ice." He countered.

"And what do you think we look like to higher species?" Rose countered. "Primitive, stupid apes knuckling around. Put yourself in the Ood's place a moment and think what it must be like to have someone who thinks your better than them coming in and enslavin' em."

"They welcomed it!" The boss man retorted, making all three of them scoff. "It's not as if they put up a fight."

"You idiot!" Donna snapped. "They're born with their brains in their hands. Don't you see? That makes them peaceful. They've got to be, 'cause a creature like that would have to trust anyone it meets."

"Nice one," The Doctor complimented her, and Rose smiled, nodding in agreement.

"Thank you," Donna replied, a touch of pride in her voice though a lot of the anger at this pompous ass in front of them was still in her voice.

"The system's worked for two hundred years, all we've got is a rogue batch."

"You think it works, but it doesn't." The Doctor replied. "You can't hear them, can't hear how scared they are, how much they're suffering."

"It's an infection," The balding man insisted. "And it's about to be sterilized." He got on the communicator, and the voice of the bloke Rose took on in the claw control room came through.

"Canisters primed, sir. As soon as the core heats up, the gas is released. Give it 200 marks, and counting." The bloke's voice came through.

"You're gonna gas them?" The Doctor asked, struggling against his cuffs as if he meant to charge the man in front of them.

"Kill the livestock," He shrugged. "The classic foot-and-mouth solution from the olden days. Still works."

"Except they aren't live stock they're intelligent creatures." Rose shouted at him, and the man laughed.

"You FOTO activists and your silly, silly notions." He said with a condescending grin. Before Rose or any of them could say another word, an alarm blared throughout the complex. If nothing else, it served to wipe the grin off balding-man's face. "What the hell," He said, gesturing for his entourage to follow, leaving two armed guards to watch them. Rose noticed a small man in a white lab coat glance back at her a moment, a sympathetic grin tugging at his lips, and she realized he was the same man who got her into the other warehouse.

None of them moved with the barrels of both guns trained on them, except for the Doctor leaning in to try and press his head to Rose's.

" _Calm,"_ His mental voice was barely a whisper with so little skin contact. " _I know you want to put up a fight but that's probably the worst thing you could do."_

Rose turned her head and glared at him. "Like I didn't already know that." She said quietly, and she sensed Donna turning to look at them.

"Sorry," The Doctor said, and Rose nodded.

" _Emergency status. Emergency status. All exits are sealed._ " A computerized voice came over the speakers, drawing their attention as they looked around the room. The guards didn't seem bothered by this except for the flicker of fear in their eyes.

The boss walked back in, a smug but stressed grin on his face as he came up to them.

"What's happening?" The Doctor asked.

"Everything you wanted, Doctor. No doubt there'll be a full police investigation once this place has been sterilized, so I can't risk a bullet to the head. I'll leave you to the mercies of the Ood." He said in a disturbingly cheerful manner.

"There's something else, isn't there? Something we haven't seen." The Doctor asked, stopping the boss and his entourage. The man in the white coat looked at Rose fleetingly before averting his gaze to the floor.

"Whaddya mean?" Donna asked, looking between the boss and the Doctor.

"A creature couldn't survive with a separate fore brain and hind brain, they'd be at war with themselves. There's got to be something else, a third element." He looked at the boss, holding the man's eye, and Rose thought she saw the start of the storm beginning to rage. "Am I right?" The Doctor challenged.

"And again, so clever." The Boss mocked.

"But it's got to be connected to the red-eye, what is it?" The Doctor asked.

The boss's false, cheerful demeanor left entirely. "'It' won't exist for very much longer." He put on that fake smile again, looked over each of them, and simply said, "Enjoy your Ood."

He left, his entourage and the two armed guards that had stayed behind before following him out the door.

"Don't hurt yourself," The Doctor half snapped as Rose instantly put her foot against the piped and pushed.

"Bloody likely I will," She countered, feeling the cuffs cut into her wrists but no give from either the pipes or the cuff chain.

"You broke your wrist a couple months ago, even with your healing capabilities it would still be fragile." He cautioned as she strained to break something other than herself again.

She fell back against the pipes, panting. "Probably a good thing I can't snap'em anyway." Rose rolled her head to look at him, and she could see the panic there.

He was stronger than her, even with her modifications, and as he pulled and strained as much as she had without anymore luck than she had, panic sat in her heart.

"You're the one with all the tricks, do something!" Donna's panic came without filter. "You must've met Houdini."

"There are really good handcuffs." The Doctor said as he struggled just a little bit more.

"Oh, well, I'm glad of that." Donna said as she tried to shake free. "I mean, at least we've got quality."

Rose snorted, trying to at least laugh at their situation when the doors slid open. "Doubt that's FOTO coming to the rescue." She said, and the Ood rounded the corner with their eyes blazing red. The walked toward them, their communicator balls extended toward them in a menacing way. "I'm gonna guess that's how they took down the guards before." She added, panic in her voice that hadn't been there in a very long time.

No hands to defend or communicated with, not enough leverage to use her feet effectively, and her Doctor and Donna just as defenseless. All Rose could do was extend herself to stand as much in front of them as she could.

"Doctor, Rose, Donna friends!" The Doctor shouted behind her.

"The Circle must be broken." Donna shouted in turn.

"Friends of the Ood." Rose shouted in turn.

The three of them repeated themselves, their words coming louder and more urgent the closer the Ood got to them. Rose could feel the static of the communicator ball on her forehead, she remaining still as the Doctor and Donna craned their head as far away as they could manage while the Doctor yelled, "Friends, friends, friends!"

The Ood stopped, bowed their heads, and looked back up. The red was gone from their eyes. "Doctor, Rose, Donna, friends." The one closest to Rose said in that overly friendly Ood voice that she had come to know.

"Yes!" They all cried out together, "yes, friends."

The Ood came around, unlocking the cuffs somehow. Maybe they had a key, Rose wasn't sure, but she didn't care. The second her arms were free she wrapped her arms around the nearest Ood's neck, making sure to touch the back of it's leather head and send it all the gratitude and care she could through the contact. She smiled at him when she pulled back, and she could see in his eyes that it was felt.

"Come on," the Doctor said, gently pulling on her arm. "We have to find the third part before any damage can be done.

"Mister Haplen will be in Warehouse 15." The Ood Rose hugged told them.

The Doctor stepped over to him, putting his hand on the Ood's shoulder. "Thank you," he said, and the Ood bowed their head in a collective nod before the trio took off.

There was only one, small problem with the Ood's advice: It was impossible to look for a number on a warehouse when the grounds had essentially become a battlefield. While neither the guards or the Ood bothered with them, but bullets fired through the air wouldn't know to avoid them. Rose was on edge, the panic and chaos making her heart hammer as she couldn't do anything to properly protect either of the people she was with.

As they turned a corner, something went off, some kind of explosion, and the three of them were thrown to the ground. Rose's knee caught something, a rock perhaps, and while she knew the pain was bad she didn't feel anything else wrong with it.

"Doctor? Donna?" Rose asked, her panic slipping through as she looked at each of them in turn from her place on the snow.

The Doctor was already helping Donna to her feet, and she was nodded. "We're alright." He said, dashing over to help pull Rose up. He looked down a her knee. "You able to walk?" He asked.

Rose looked down, seeing the knee in her jeans had been ripped and there was a bit of blood on her skin. Must have been a sharp rock.

"I'll hobble for a few minutes, but I'll be fine."

"Oi, you two." Donna said, and the couple looked to where Donna was.

A loan Ood was slowly advancing toward them, his eyes yellow.

"Doctor, Donna, Rose. I am Ood Sigma. Please, allow me to escort you to your destination." It said in the ever polite manner, turning and starting to head off in the direction it came from. The three only exchanged a quick glance before they all seemed to agree to let the Ood be their guide.

Rose leaned on the Doctor for the first couple minutes, her knee feeling strong enough to support her weight again after a bit, and by the time they got to the warehouse door she was standing independently again.

The Doctor soniced the lock, and the door swung open. Sigma caught it, waving the others in first before following close behind.

It wasn't a very big building, and once inside they found themselves in an open space, on a walkway, hovering over what Rose believed had to be a giant brain.

"The Ood brain," The Doctor confirmed. "Now it all makes sense. That's the missing link," He pointed. "The third element binding them together. Fore brain, hind brain, and this, the telepathic center. It's a shared mind, connecting all the Ood in song."

"And their hindering it," Rose said, noting the posts emitting a visible electrical pulse around it.

"And once I've destroyed it I can always go into Cargo." The boss, Haplen, said coming out of the shadows with a gun drawn, aimed at them. As Rose slowly stepped around to put herself between the gun and the Doctor, Donna behind him, she noted the FOTO man in the white lab coat coming in with him. "I've got the rockets, I've got the sheds. Smaller business, much more manageable without livestock." Haplen continued.

"He's mined the area," Man in the lab coat warned them, and Rose glanced down to see something stuck to the outer edges, though she couldn't see what.

"Those pylons?" The Doctor asked.

"In a circle," Donna said. "The circle must be broken."

"Those pylons have been giving off an electric pulse for over two hundred years," Haplen said with arrogant pride.

"Dampening the telepathic field, preventing the Ood from connecting. You knew they were smarter than they seemed, you just didn't care." The Doctor yelled, and Rose didn't need to see him to know he had a dangerous glint in his eye that Haplen should have been scared of.

He merely smiled. "Indeed. And you, Ood Sigma, you brought them here. I expected better." He said, looking around them to where Sigma was likely standing at the back.

"My place is at your side," Sigma replied, and Rose noted the bit of sarcasm in the tone. Odd for an Ood.

Haplen laughed. "Still subservient. Good Ood." He mocked.

Rose snickered.

"If that barrier is still in place, how come the Ood started breaking out?" Donna asked, and Haplen seemed to consider this.

"Maybe it's taken centuries to adapt." The Doctor reasoned. "The subconscious reaching out."

"But the process was too slow," FOTO man said, stepping forward and moving to stand between Rose and Haplen. "I lowered the barrier to its minimum. Friends of the Ood, sir. It's taken me ten years to infiltrate the company, and I succeeded." He sounded proud, strong, like he was fully aware that Haplen was likely going to shoot him now.

"Yes," Haplen said, "Yes you did." And without hesitation he reached out, grabbed the FOTO doctor, and threw him over the railing into the giant brain below.

"You, you murdered him." Donna said incredulously, and Rose's heart began to pound.

A bullet she could take, live long enough to wrestle the gun from Haplen, and revive in time to help the Doctor stop the brain from being destroyed. But Rose hadn't exactly been swallowed by something, and wasn't so sure she could come back from that. She doubted a brain could spit something back out.

"Very observant, Ginger," Haplen said as he cocked the gun. "No then, can't say I've ever shot anyone before. Can't say I'm gonna like it. But it's not exactly a normal day, is it?" He said.

Rose shifted a bit, hoping to better block the Doctor. "Heard it was better to get all done and over with, empty the chamber as quick as possible." She said, hoping to sound more confident than she felt as she eyed the gun nervously. It always hurt, always. And while she wasn't looking forward to feeling that pain six or more times over, it was better than one hitting the Doctor and forcing him to regenerate. Or worse.

"Is it? Could always find out." He said.

"Would you like a drink, sir." Sigma said, suddenly standing between her and Haplen.

"I think hair loss is the least of my problems right now, thanks," Haplen snapped.

"Please have a drink, sir." Sigma insisted, holding out a shot glass of clear liquid.

"If you're going to stand in their way, I'll have to shoot you too." Haplen warned, and Rose felt the Doctor grab the back of her jacket before she could move to protect Sigma as well. She then felt his cool fingers on her neck.

" _Wait."_  He said in her mind.  _"Something's going on here."_

"Please have a drink, sir." Sigma offered again, and this time there was a challenge in his tone. A threat.

"Have … have you poisoned me?" Haplen said, his cold, calculating smile vanishing slowly.

"Natural Ood must never kill, Sir." Sigma taunted.

"What is that stuff?" The Doctor asked, stepping around Rose to stand beside Sigma.

"Ood-graft suspended in a biological compound, sir." Sigma replied honestly, and if he had a mouth with lips, Rose would imagine he'd be smirking.

"What the hell does that mean?" Haplen asked, his fear and anger mixing as he slowly lowered the gun.

"Oh dear," The Doctor grinned faintly. "That's …."

"Tell me!" Haplen demanded, his mouth foaming a little.

"Funny thing, the subconscious. Takes all sorts of shapes. Came out in the red-eye as revenger, the rabid Ood as anger. And then there was patience. All that intelligence and mercy focused on Ood Sigma." And then the smile fleshed out on the Doctor's face just a touch more. "How's the hair loss, Mister Haplen?"

"Oh," Rose said, her mind putting it all together.

She watched Haplen reach up, touch his hair, chunks of it coming off his head.

"What have you done?" He asked Sigma.

"Can you hear that?" Rose asked him. "That song in your head?" She couldn't hear it, didn't know if it had changed from a sad lament to a victorious chant, but she understood that Haplen likely could.

"Standing next to the Ood brain, no doubt he can." The Doctor replied for him.

The gun clattered to the floor, and even though Haplen was too busy grabbing at his head to worry about it, habit made Rose reach for the weapon and remove the clip. She tossed the weapon aside, stuffing the clip in her pockets to make sure they were out of reach should Haplen change his mind.

Though by the looks of things, that wasn't going to happen. Rose's stomach flipped and flopped as she turned in time to see Haplen practically vomit tentacles, his head much more Ood-like than when she looked before. His eyes changed before her, and she understood Haplen was no more.

"They turned him into an Ood." Donna said, and Rose glanced behind her to see she looked as sickened by it as Rose was.

"Yep," The Doctor replied.

"He's an Ood," Donna repeated.

"I noticed." The Doctor said as the Ood formally known as Haplen wound up for a sneeze. As it was released, a tiny hind brain flew from his mouth and landed in his hands.

"He has become Oodkind, and we will take care of him." Sigma reassured, and oddly enough Rose believed him. Haplen would come to no harm, because he was Haplen no more.

"It's weird, being with you two. I can't tell what's right or wrong any more." Donna admitted as Rose went to the railing, leaning over and and deactivating the explosives before they could come close to activating.

"Better that way. People who know for certain tend to be like Haplen. Anyway, Sigma," the Doctor said as Rose turned away from the railing and leaning with her back against it. "Would you allow me to do the honor of breaking the circle?" He asked the Ood.

The Ood nodded, "It is yours, Doctor." He replied, and the Doctor beamed.

"Oh yes!" He cried before darting to a control panel, his excited, manic movements bringing a smile to Rose's face. She turned to Donna, and while the Ginger looked worn she was smiling just as wide. "Stifled for two hundred years, but not anymore." The Doctor continued, flicking a switch and the electic pulse around the brain stopped. "The circle is broken, the Ood can sing!"

And at once, Rose could hear it. The beautiful, happy melody that soothed her soul in a way that only the Doctor's words could for so many years. The song ingrained itself in her, and she closed her eyes as Donna's laughter rang happily in the room, as melodious as the song itself.

"I can hear it!" She exclaimed, laughing more happily than before, the Doctor joining her.

And while she couldn't laugh, being as overcome with it all as she was, Rose smiled through the tears that ran down her face.

* * *

 

They'd returned to the TARDIS with Sigma and a few other Ood having walked them there. On the way, Rose basked in the song, remained gloveless as a particular natural born Ood continued to hover near her, occasionally touching the fingers of her free hand. She only got appreciation and thanks from him, something warm as well that she couldn't put her finger on. Perhaps fondness? Through her contact with the Doctor from their entwined hands she could feel his pride, his joy in her, the overwhelming love and admiration he had of her. And of Donna as well. Every time he looked at her, Rose felt that same fondness she felt for the ginger reflected back.

As they stood outside the TARDIS doors, the three of them turned to face the Oods that came with them.

"You should be seeing Rockets coming in a few days," The Doctor said to Sigma. "The song would have resonated across the galaxies, everyone will have heard it. The Ood will be coming home soon."

"We thank you, Doctor Donna, friends of the Oodkind. And Rose, protector of innocent. What will you do now? Would you care to stay? There is room in the song for you." Sigma offered.

"We've sort of got a song of our own, thanks." The Doctor replied.

"Your song will change soon." Sigma replied thoughtfully.

The Doctor's hand tensed in Rose's. "Meaning?" he asked.

"One such as you can not sing the same song forever," Sigma replied.

"But not too soon, I hope." Rose said nervously.

Sigma turned to her, a smile in her eyes. "No."

"Well then, we'll be off." The Doctor said, getting his key out his pocket and inserting it into the lock.

"Please, take this song with you," Sigma said, and the song the Ood sang as they were released started up again.

"Believe me," Rose said, "it's with us."

"Always," The Doctor added, and Donna waved as he opened the door.

"And know this, Doctor Donna," Sigma said before they could move. "You will never be forgotten. Our children will sing of the Doctor Donna, and our children's children. And the wind and the ice and the snow will carry your names forever."

Donna glanced at Rose before stepping inside. The Doctor followed, letting go of Rose's hand and allowing her another moment on the snow planet. She held Sigma's eye a moment, glancing at the Ood she bonded with, and smiled. "Thank you," She said to them, and Sigma merely nodded.

She stepped inside the TARDIS, closing the door behind her as the Doctor put them in the Vortex. Her eyes fell on the hand, seeing it glowing a bit more furiously than it had before. "Rose?" The Doctor asked, and before she could get him to look, the glowing stopped. "You okay?" He asked.

"'M fine," She replied, looking up to see the confusion and worry in his face.

"I almost wanted to go home," Donna said thoughtfully, pulling the couple's attention to her. She was looking at the hand, or at least that was the general direction her eyes were focused on as she spoke. "I was so close to wanting to give it up. All that pain, the suffering the Ood were going through. Seeing what kind of monsters we become, it made me want to go back to not knowing. But now, the difference you can make, the … the, oh god the  _feeling_  of joy the Ood had at being saved. How could I ever give that up? How could I ever want to stop traveling with you if that's the good we do?"

Rose smiled, looking to the Doctor, watching him grin as he reached into his pocket. "Well, if you're sure you want to stay." He said, slowly moving around the console to Donna. He glanced at Rose, giving her a wink before he pulled out a simple chain with a TARDIS key on it. "Suppose you should have one of these."

"Are you serious?" Donna asked, her jaw dropping as she looked wide-eyed between the two as she took the key from the Doctor. "Oh you're joking! Wait, does this mean I can learn how to fly this?" She gestured around the console with the key.

The TARDIS hummed with approval. "If you want," the Doctor said, and Donna jumped up and down, waving her arms before she hugged him first, than Rose.

"Honestly, finding you two again. It's dangerous, and crazy, and morals are all over the place, but I wouldn't trade it for anything." She said, a gauntlet of emotions in her eyes.

"Well, we've done danger for a couple days. I know a nice, quiet planet where we can rest for a bit if you want." The Doctor offered.

"That would be nice, yeah." Donna laughed. "But I'm going to get cleaned up and changed. I smell like Ood." She said, turning sharply and heading down the hall.

"And you?" The Doctor asked, turning to Rose. "How are you after all this?"

Rose smiled, "I didn't kill anyone, always a good day."

"You seem a bit better somehow." The Doctor noted, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear and caressing her cheek in the process. He showed her what she looked like to him. Less feral, more protective. Even at what he considered her most dangerous moments, he somehow didn't see her the way she did. But he didn't know, did he? The way she moved after the bloke in the claw control room, the rage she felt, the damage she wanted to do to him for even daring to hurt her Doctor. Barely willing to, she showed him what happened.

He sighed, "I've still seen you worse." He reminded her.

"Yeah," She agreed. "Maybe I am cooling down a bit. I'm just worried of what Donna will say if she ever …." And there it was, out in the open once more. The reason she didn't want a new companion in all those years.

"I don't know why, but I don't think Donna will be as scared of you as you seem to think she will be." He said thoughtfully.

"Yeah, maybe you're right." Rose said, sighing. "So where we going? Should I change?" She asked.

He looked her over. "Your jeans are ripped, might want to change them." He suggested.

She looked down, having forgotten entirely about her knee since it was completely healed. "Right. I'll only be a mo'." She said, standing on her tip toes to give him a brief peck before darting down the hall.

Rose looked over her shoulder, smiling at the Doctor as he moved around the console.

The hand glowed again, but she chose to ignore it.

For now.


	8. The Sontaran Stratagem pt 1

The TARDIS landed with a far gentler thud, and Donna smiled. "She's better at driving than you." She teased the Doctor as he entered the console room, looking confused a second before he saw Rose at the console.

"Show off," He said teasingly, and she smiled with her tongue between her teeth.

"If that's what you think," She said with a shrug. "Alright, Donna. I've taken you to my favorite place to do some shopping. Could always pick up something for your Gramps."

The thought hadn't really occurred to Donna to pick up a souvenir, though she wondered if maybe he'd actually want an alien thing. Still, couldn't hurt to look. "Alright." She said eagerly, getting to her feet. "Wait, what about money? They don't take Visa, or anything."

Rose chuckled, sticking her hand out toward the Doctor who stared at it a long moment. He looked at Rose, then to Donna, then back to her hand.

"Oh, right," he said, suddenly understanding what Rose was quietly asking for. He stuck his hands in his pockets, digging around until he pulled out a stick. "Don't spend it all in one place." He said.

"Not coming with us?" Donna asked as she and Rose headed toward the doors.

"Nah," The Doctor said, getting down on his knees beside the hand. It glowed a moment, but he didn't seem to notice. "You girls go on, I'm gonna stay here and work on the TARDIS."

"Don't let him tinker you to death," Rose said, looking and pointing at the ceiling. The TARDIS brightened a moment, and Rose giggled before she looked to her. "Alright, Donna, let's go do some shopping." And with that, Rose opened the TARDIS doors and they stepped outside.

It was more alien than the Ood Sphere, but somehow more manageable. There were aliens and creatures that looked human absolutely everywhere, going stall to stall like the bazaars Donna had seen in movies set in the middle east. There was music coming from somewhere in the distance, and the smell was strange but heavenly. Like coffee, vanilla, leather, and bubble gum, oddly enough, but it all brought a smile to Donna's face.

"This is brilliant.' She gasped, looking to see Rose smiling contentedly.

"Shoulda been your first experience with aliens." She said, smirking. "Aside from the obvious."

"What was your first?" Donna asked as she and Rose started moving slowly through the market place.

"End of the world," Rose said with snort. "First trip with the Doctor. Brought me five billion years into my future to watch the Earth burn."

Donna snorted, "How romantic."

Rose laughed, "We do call that our first date." She said, her expression turning wistful. "He was a different man back then. Looked older, more dangerous. Probably what attracted me to him at first, that danger. I didn't know what to think after that first trip, overwhelmed as I was. But I knew in my gut that he needed someone, and I wanted to be that someone."

"And now you are," Donna said, watching as Rose's smile didn't quite reach her eyes. "You say he was a different man." She changed the avenue of conversation a touch as they stopped in front of a stall selling strange looking fruit-like things.

Rose picked two up the same up without hesitation, flashing the weird stick thing to the merchant. He scanned it with a wide grin, bidding them a good day in a language that likely wasn't English but sounded like it anyway, and Rose handed her the second fruit.

"You remember the other Doctor in Pompeii?" She asked, and Donna watched as Rose took a bite out of the fruit despite the fuzziness to the purple skin. Donna nodded, watching with fascination as Rose pulled the fruit away to reveal the bright orange flesh. After a second of chewing, Rose turned and grinned slyly at Donna. "Was he gorgeous? I can't really remember what he looks like, just that he had silver hair and was easily the rudest I've met yet."

Donna snorted. "He wasn't a looker in my books, but I'm not the one who'll marry him." She countered, beaming at Rose as she laughed.

"Well, a lot of people would say that about the Doctor I first met but I always thought he was bloody gorgeous. But yeah, he changed. Like the Doctor said, a way to cheat death, and he had to do that." She said, looking down at the fruit in her hand.

"What happened?" Donna asked, taking a small bite from the plum sized fruit. She was surprised when the fuzz melted on her tongue like candy floss, and the flesh tasted like a perfect balance of grape and orange.

Rose led them over to the square, sitting down on the edge of a fountain that had green tinted water, and Donna joined her promptly.

"The short version is he sent me away so I wouldn't die, I was stubborn and wouldn't leave him, did something stupid with the help of the TARDIS, became a goddess for a short time, and he died taking the power out of me. It made him change into the man he is now."

Donna nodded, taking a bigger bite now that she wasn't so scared of what she was eating. "A goddess." She finally said.

"Yep," Rose said, popping the 'p'. "Called myself Bad Wolf."

"Bad Wolf?" Donna asked sardonically.

"Yeah, not sure what that was about. I guess, I dunno, being with the Doctor was always like a fairytale, and I didn't relate well to princess awaiting their Prince. And I did it for him, to protect him. I dunno, that's just who I am, I guess. 'Cause even now, powerless in one way I'm …." She stopped, trailing off, looking at the half eaten fruit in her hand like she was utterly lost.

"You're powerful still." Donna noted, because it had been painfully evident from the moment she caught up with them. And right now, in an alien market with no Doctor around, Donna wondered if maybe she would get answers to some of those questions she had filed away. Because if either of them were going to talk, it certainly wasn't going to be Spaceman. "Is that why you two seem different? Roles reversed? You said the Huons changed you, are they related?"

"God, you're brilliant." Rose said, no trace of disbelief or sarcasm Donna could hear. The blonde turned to face her with a light smile playing on her face. "Yeah, 's related. When we met you, those things in me from the TARDIS were dormant. They activated in the lab."

"So what did it do?" Donna asked after taking a bite of the alien food.

"Stronger, faster to think, heal easy." Rose looked away. "And dangerous."

"You?" Donna said incredulously, but she remembered all too well that fire in Rose's eye when they were facing some serious danger. "Suppose I see it."

"Doctor's life is in danger, and I sorta snap. I don't really know what I'm doing, but I am fully aware of it."

"Because he's your boyfriend?" Donna asked, finishing off the purple thing.

"Because he's my mate. My life depends on him living, so its self defense as much as it is protection." Rose said.

"I don't understand." Donna shook her head.

Rose smirked, tossing the last of her fruit in her mouth and chewing as she seemed to find the words. As she did, Donna took a few deep breaths, trying to reconcile what had happened to the young woman who lost her Mum that turned her into the woman she sat beside now.

After swallowing, Rose wrung her hands, turning toward Donna but looking at a spot near her feet. "You know when you're a teenager, and you fall in love for the first time 'n' you swear you're gonna be with him forever? How you write your name with his last name all over your notebook, and you deny anyone who'll say it won't last?" Rose peeked up and looked at Donna, and she nodded. "Kinda did that with time."

"What?" Donna asked.

And Rose, this woman who she'd watched stand in front of a gun without hesitation, who was willing to throw herself in front of a fire breathing rock alien or die by Ood ball thing, blushed bashfully. "I could control time, yeah? I could change myself so I'd never age, never wither. I was nineteen years old in love with a man who would out live me by centuries, and I made it so I wouldn't die until he does. 'S like I wrote out our names together with permanent ink across the stars, and hoped to any and all gods that he loved me too."

"So he dies, and you …."

"Yeah," Rose nodded.

"So when you get all …."

"I'm saving my life as much as I am his." She nodded again. "The upside? Can't die otherwise."

"Sorry?" Donna said, gapping at her. "Is that what you meant by you died a few dozen times?"

"Yeah," Rose laughed.

"Well that's just … oi, the pair of ya. He's an alien, you may as well be. And what's with the hand?" She asked and Rose's eyes went wide.

"The hand in the jar?" She asked, and Donna had to wonder if maybe there was a Thing like creature reminiscent of the Addam's family roaming around the space ship. Maybe that's why Donna always had cleaned towels, and her clothes were always properly put back in place after she left the bedroom. "What about it?" Rose asked carefully.

"Why does it glow?" She asked, a little afraid of the answer if a woman who calls herself Bad Wolf seemed worried about it.

"You see it?" Rose asked. "You see it glow?"

"Yeah," Donna replied. "Why?"

"Because the Doctor doesn't. He never seems to notice it. I had this … this dream, I think, right before we met up with you again. An older Doctor that I've met before was in the TARDIS, and he saw it, and he was, I dunno, nervous or something. But that's the thing, it was a dream, and I dunno if it's something I should worry about or not. And if you see it too then it's not just in my head, 's real."

The two stared at each other for a long while, and Donna could practically see Rose thinking behind her hazel eyes. She watched as Rose squinted, her hand going to her head.

"What's wrong?" Donna asked.

Rose smiled. "Thinking too quickly, brain trying to calculate what it all means without having all the variables. Gives me a migraine. Hold on." She closed her eyes, taking a few deep breaths, and Donna noted how all the tension left Rose's face. The relief was palatable. "Alright, 'nough of that. How's about we do some shopping, yeah?"

Just as the two women got to their feet, a cell phone rang. Rose's brow furrowed, and she reached into her pockets, searching before pulling out her cell phone. She looked at the screen, and swallowed. "Donna, I'm sorry, I gotta take this." She said, reaching in her other pocket and handing Donna the strange stick. ""S unlimited, so buy what ever you want. I'll wait right here for ya, okay?"

"Unlimited credit?" Donna said with a grin, getting one out of Rose. "Can handle that." She said, waving as Rose answered her phone, greeting someone named Jack for the second time in two days.

She walked along the market stalls, looking at various clothing pieces and odd alien things she couldn't tell if it was an instrument or spare part. She found a hat for her Granddad that she thought he'd like that didn't scream 'alien', and while she considered picking up some kind of tea for her mother a tall, severe looking bloke came up beside her. She looked at him as he looked at her, a goofy but friendly grin that made his eyes brighten but certainly didn't help with his looks. Not that he was bad looking, but he certainly wasn't her type. Build maybe, but that was the only thing he had going for him. Too much black, reminded her of that boy she dated way back when who ended up being gay as the day was long.

"Hello," He said, his voice friendly, deep, and gruff.

"Hello," She said, hoping her smile conveyed a total 'not interested, especially if you're alien' turn down without being mean about it. She glanced over the teas, hesitating over a lot of them as the TARDIS merely translated their names to things like 'licorice' or 'fruit blend'. She wasn't even sure what the canisters actually looked like, and even though she had brought her passport with her, Donna wasn't sure where she could possibly travel to that would return goods like these. And since she was on a time machine, how much time will have passed since she last saw her mother, anyway?

"Don't get the pear one, it's disgusting. And while you're at it, don't get the sugar cane. My friend got it last time we were here and it was terrible, tasted nothin' like sugar at all."

"Got it," Donna said to the man who still hadn't left her side.

"You haven't seen her, by the way, have you?" He asked. "She's about your height, blonde, hazel eyes, human."

"Sounds like my friend Rose," She said, picking up a tea that said 'spice', hoped it was like Chai, and flashed her credit stick at the merchant. She smiled at the confused looking man, and left as quick as she could.

She was relieved to see Rose by the fountain still, and glanced over her shoulder to make sure the bloke didn't try to follow her. When she didn't see him, she smiled at Rose as she got off the phone.

"Sorry, was our mate, Jack. He and I sorta share the whole 'can't stay dead' thing, and we talk about it with each other whenever it happens." She explained.

"He's tied to the Doctor too?" Donna asked.

"No, I made him immortal by accident. Oh, you bought tea." Rose smiled, pointing to the canister in Donna's hand and glazing over what seemed like a pretty big deal. "You didn't get the sugar cane one, did ya? It's rubbish, even my mum couldn't make a good cuppa outta it, and she always made the best tea."

Donna looked over her shoulder for the bloke again, only this time seeing his confusion in a new light. Was he …? Seriously, that was who Rose called bloody gorgeous? Well, she supposed beauty was in the eye of the beholder, and Donna figured that maybe it didn't really matter one way or another, alien was alien and she'd just never find that attractive. Even if she didn't know the difference.

Rose's phone rang again, and she rolled her eyes, mumbling something Donna didn't quite catch about availability when Rose stopped mid ramble and gapped at the screen. A second later she quickly answered.

"Martha? What is it?"

* * *

 

"Rose," Martha's voice came through the line, a contradiction of uncertain and confident. "I need the Doctor back here on Earth for something. Are you with him?" She asked, and Rose gestured toward the TARDIS with her head, and Donna nodded.

"Will be in a mo'," Rose replied as she and Donna weaved their way through the alien market. They hadn't gotten very far in their wandering apparently, and a beat later they were in the TARDIS, startling and confusing the Doctor from where he laid underneath the console in his blue suit.

As they had been walking, Martha continued. "Good. Day is April twenty-sixth, 2008. London," She had said, and at this point Rose was kneeling in front of the Doctor.

"Allow me to hand you over to the Captain," She said with a wink that made the Doctor even more confused before handing him her cell phone.

Once he was on it, Rose turned to Donna and allowed her smile to falter. Donna narrowed her eyes in confusion, and Rose mouthed Martha's name. Donna nodded, seeming to understand before gesturing to the corridor with her head.

"We'll be there in a moment." Rose heard the Doctor say, turning in time to see him toss her super phone over to her. She snatched it from the air and put it back in her pocket as he danced around the console and piloted their course. "Did you ladies have fun?" He asked them with a grin.

"Barely had time to look at anything," Rose confessed, realizing only a beat later how petty it might sound.

"I'm just going to put this stuff in my room," Donna said. "Though, Rose, if you don't mind, I'd like you to tell me more about this bloke I met there. Seemed to know you." Donna said, looping her arm around Rose's and pulling her down the corridor.

Rose glanced over her shoulder, seeing the light in the Doctor's eye and the slight smile pulling on his lips as he gave a single nod, putting his hands in his pockets.

When they turned the corner, Donna asked, "Who's Martha?"

"Thought you wanted to know about a bloke?" Rose countered, and Donna stopped outside a door.

Rose took in the design, baffled a bit by it. There was the standard Gallifreyan that likely said Donna's name, surrounding it being little yellow and purple flowers. But what was more, the door was TARDIS blue, the wording gold, and the only two other times Rose had seen a companion's door look that: back when she had her own bedroom, and Jack's. Neither Mickey nor Martha had one quite so elegant, and from what Rose could remember Adam's looked like it was going to fall off the hinges.

Donna turned the knob and stepped inside. "Oh, I already figured out he was the Doctor." She said as tossed the hat and canister of tea on to her bed. "Didn't really see what you did, but that's not important. What is is who this Martha woman is, and why you don't seem to keen on seeing her.

Rose smirked, leaning against the wall by the door as she met Donna's eye. "How much has he told you about the time after we left you?"

"Not a lot," Donna admitted. "Learn most of it from you."

"Martha's the one we had with us that things happened, with her and her family. But there's more to the story than just bad things happened." Rose looked to her feet, hiding behind her hair. It had been five years, but hearing Martha made it seem like barely any time at all. "She loved him. Martha, she loved the Doctor."

"Oi, you're telling me it's more than just you who fancies him? He's a rail. A stick. An alien stick." Donna teased.

Rose barely resisted the grin. "He was always mine, but …."

"Yeah," Donna nodded. "I understand."

"But it's not just that. She's a reminder of what happened. It's only been a year for her."

The TARDIS hummed in Rose's mind just before landing, warning her that someone was already outside waiting.

"Shall we?" Rose asked, and Donna nodded while the two left the room. The console room was just outside Donna's room now, and the Doctor was already out the door. Rose tried not to picture some kind of swept up reunion, knowing better after all this time but still finding it hard not to be jealous. It had been less than a year for Martha, and she wasn't sure if it was enough time to get over someone.

Stepping out of the already opened doors, Rose's eyes fell instantly on Martha and decided that maybe a year was a lot longer than she remembered. She had expected to see their former companion in casual dress, something stunning but simple like she had worn on her time on the TARDIS. Instead, she saw a uniform that was distinctly military, reminiscent of those she saw so many people wear during the year that never was.

For her sake, Martha smiled when she saw Rose, and while friendly it certainly didn't reach her eyes.

"You haven't changed a bit, either." She noted.

"On the outside, maybe." Rose said as she came to stand by the Doctor. Martha threw her arms around her in a tight hug that Rose returned despite it not being expected.

When Martha pulled back she smiled at Rose for only a moment before it fell, her eyes having fallen on something over Rose's shoulder.

Turning, Rose spotted Donna stepping out of the TARDIS and closing the door behind her.

"Ah." Martha said. "Didn't take long."

"Martha, this is Donna." The Doctor introduced as Martha stepped back.

Donna strutted over, hand extended as she looked at Martha with a smile. "I've heard all about you." She said simply, and Rose couldn't deny the swell of glee that came from her gut as Martha paled.

"I dread to think," She said, and it was terribly obvious that she really did dread it. She fidgeted, and the flex of her fingers drew Rose's attention to her hand.

"That is some ring," She said louder than she meant to, which made Donna crane to look at Martha's left hand. "Is that what I think it is?" Rose asked, pointing and making Martha smile with relief.

"Yeah," She said, lifting her hand and playing with the ring. The three diamonds sparkled. "His name's Tom. Technically I met him during the, well, you know. But after I phoned the hospital he works at and eventually found a way to meet him again. He's in pediatrics, working out in Africa right now." She laughed on her sigh. "Got my own doctor who disappears off to distant places."

"Is he skinny?" Donna asked, as the Doctor took Rose's hand in her own.

"You're worried about her." He said, sounding genuinely surprised in Rose's mind.

"It's only been a year, and she's engaged to a man she met during a very traumatic time." Rose explained through their bond. "'Course I'm concerned. A year is quick for an engagement under normal circumstances."

"We weren't really together long before I gave you a ring." He countered.

She looked up at him with a smirk. "Still not officially engaged, either." She retorted, and he glared at her with a smile.

"He's sort of … strong." Martha replied to Donna. "But enough catching up, there's a job that needs to be done." She said, getting on a walkie-talkie, turning sharply around and walking a few feet away. "This is Doctor Jones. Operation Blue Sky is go, go, go. I repeat, this is a go." She commanded.

They poured over the area, all in the same uniform as Martha though most all donned a burgundy Beret as well as a gun. Trucks came in with more of them, and as Martha moved and shouted orders, Rose closed herself off. She remembered it like it was yesterday, being in one of their jeeps, running missions for them in an effort to slow or hinder the Master. UNIT. At this moment, Rose would rather Torchwood, but only because of Jack.

"What are you looking for?" The Doctor asked Martha as she returned to their side to get out of the way.

"Illegal aliens," She said, thought Rose knew it wasn't the kind Earth military would normally be concerned about.

As soldiers ran past, entering the building behind the TARDIS, Donna looked at them. "I never would have pictured Martha being a soldier." She said.

"Because she wasn't before." Rose replied, allowing the Doctor to tug her hand as he followed Martha across the lot.

"I noticed you're a proper doctor now." The Doctor said as they caught up to Martha, and she smiled proudly over her shoulder.

"That I am." She replied.

"Congratulations, that's wonderful." Rose said sincerely.

"Thanks. UNIT rushed it through, given my experience in the field." She said almost teasingly, waving them to follow her as she headed in to what looked like a giant transport truck. "We're establishing a field base on site. They're dying to meet you." Martha said to the Doctor as she led them up the stairs.

"Wish I could say the same," the Doctor grumbled, and despite her own discomfort, Rose gave his hand a squeeze as they went inside.

It was an office, a much larger than expected office. Dare Rose say it was bigger … but no, she wouldn't. Not even in her mind, in case a bit of it slipped through her contact with the Doctor. She checked over her shoulder to ensure Donna was still close behind, and she glimpsed the ginger looking entirely unimpressed. As if she needed more reasons to like her.

"Operation Blue Sky complete, sir. Thanks for letting me take the lead." Martha said as she approached one of the very few people not in a black uniform but traditional military green. "And this is the Doctor. Doctor, Colonel Mace." Martha introduced them with a smile, and the colonel saluted.

"Oh don't do that." The Doctor grumbled, gesture for the hand to be lowered.

"Well, it's an honor, sir. I've read all the files on you, and technically speaking, you're still on staff. You never resigned."

"What, you used to work for them?" Donna asked, and Rose's mouth twitched into a smile at the shock.

"Yeah, long time ago, back in the seventies. Or was it the eighties? But it was all a bit more homespun back then." The Doctor replied, and Rose started to feel the discomfort trickling through from him.

"Times have changed, sir." The Colonel replied.

"Come on now, Doctor, you've seen it." Martha said with a playful nudge and a smile. "You've been on board the Valiant."

"Not something we discuss," Rose snapped without thinking, pulling her hand away from the Doctor's abruptly despite the swell of rage the name of the ship sent her. She took deep breaths, feeling the Doctor's eyes on her but Donna's hand on her shoulder.

"It's all funded by the United Nations in the name of home world security." The Colonel's voice added. "A modern UNIT for a modern world."

"What, and that means arresting ordinary factor workers? In the streets in broad daylight? It's more like Guantanamo Bay out there. " Donna asked, and Rose turned to see the stare down she was giving the colonel. "Donna, by the way. Donna Noble, and this is Rose Tyler since you didn't ask. And we'll have a salute."

The Colonel glanced at the Doctor, then to Rose, then to Donna. "Ma'ams." He saluted, and the tension in Rose was gone as she tried to stop the smile.

"Thank you," Donna said with a nod, turning away and winking at Rose before she took in the rest of the room.

"Tell me, Colonel, what's going on in the factory?" The Doctor asked, and Rose figured he meant the giant warehouse thing they had parked the TARDIS beside.

"Yesterday fifty-two people died in identical circumstances right across the world, in eleven different time zones." Mace replied, pointing to the screen and bringing up the eleven death across the world.

"Not good with time zones, but I'm guessing that's all the same time." Rose said, pointing at the screen and looking to the Colonel. He gave a nod, his mouth a grim line.

"You mean they died simultaneously?" The Doctor asked incredulously. The colonel nodded to him that time.

"Blimey, that's unsettling." Rose said, looking at the different places marked on the global map. Her heart caught at a North American location, but she tried not to dwell on it too much. Considering that by all technicality they could have known any of those fifty two people, she and the Doctor having traveled nearly all of the world since their time together, it didn't seem fair to worry about one more than another. Even if she did have a certain fondness for him.

"How did they die?" The Doctor asked.

"They were all inside their cars," The colonel fidgeted.

"They were poisoned. I check the biopsies, no toxins. Whatever it is, it left the system immediately." Martha said, sounding more and more like a stranger every time she spoke.

Rose took a deep breath and looked around the UNIT office again. Her mind started going back to that dreadful year, the last time she had been in London this long aside from the Adipose invasion. And before that … well, they'd been there sporadically, but never really sitting still. Always something to investigate. Which was fine, normally, but this place, these people, those uniforms.

Rose swallowed the lump, trying to quiet the voices and shouts in her mind as she recalled the people who were killed by her, and tried to kill her as well. Her heart pounded, and her breathing was quiet but ragged.

"Rose?" The Doctor's voice cut through, and she turned to find him directly behind her, specs on, hand hovered near her as if he was going to try and calm her.

"I can't do this," She whispered quietly, reaching into his pockets and searching until she found the leather bill fold of the psychic paper. She got up on her toes, kissing him quickly on the lips before looking to Donna. "You need me, you call. He should've put my number in your phone with his jiggery-pokery the other day." Donna nodded, somehow seeming to understand, and smiled slightly before Rose looked to Martha. "I trust you remember how to keep him in line?" She asked.

"Yeah, of course." Martha replied, eyes wide.

Rose nodded once. "You," she said to the Doctor. "Find me when you need me."

He nodded. And as she left the truck, so did they, but she headed for the streets while they headed inside the factory.

She could call Jack, but the trip from Cardiff would be pointless. Calling wouldn't be good either. Sure, Earth calls nearly always hit the right mark, but once in a while they didn't, and she wasn't sure she could recall what would have happened in the last couple months for him.

So Rose walked, using the psychic paper to board a bus and rode it into the city. She had a place in mind, as morbid as it was, but she really, really needed to talk to someone. Even if it was essentially herself.

* * *

 

It felt weird seeing the Doctor again. When the deaths happened, and UNIT started to scramble for a way to contact him Martha knew that it was her time to shine. To prove she was somehow worthy of the good word the Time Lord had put in, that she was amazing. Because despite everything, sometimes she felt like maybe she was over her head in UNIT.

The year that never was had been excellent training, but it was training so few got to see and remember that she often got looks from people she had managed to outrank simply for her former companion status. But with the Doctor here, it was proof that she earned her spot even if all she did was make a phone call.

But she didn't expect everything to feel so different. She didn't expect to look at him and see him as handsome with a pang in her heart that wasn't what it used to be. More that she remembered him fondly, like an ex-boyfriend she never had. She didn't expect Rose to leave his side, either, or for him to be okay with it. She remembered what she saw on the Valiant all that time ago, but it somehow didn't really reconcile with her that Rose was killed in front of her but walked away. That she didn't die in an explosive fire like she thought. It was all just off somehow.

With their new companion off wandering the factor, all that remained between Martha and answers from the Doctor was Colonel Mace, and she couldn't very well ask him to leave.

So as the Doctor investigated the ATMOS equipment, she waited for her moment.

"Ionising nano membrane carbon dioxide converter. Means that ATMOS works by filtering out the CO2 at a molecular level," The Doctor said, and Martha wasn't sure if it was to himself or to them.

"We know that, but what's its origin? Is it alien?" Colonel Mace had got to the point, and Martha knew it was because all this made him nervous. He wasn't new to the alien stuff, just heading it.

"No, decades ahead of it's time." The Doctor said as he bent over the ATMOS device sitting on the clear, plastic engine shaped structure. As he examined it, Mace bent over, crowding in on him. "Do you mind? Could you stand back a bit?" The Doctor asked, his tone not all that different from before but certainly carrying a subtle rudeness in his words that Martha sorta missed. And instantly missed Rose calling him out on it.

"Sorry, have I done something wrong?" Mace asked the Doctor, his hands still firmly behind his back where he normally kept them, looking between Martha and the Doctor to see where he'd been offended.

"You're carrying a gun. I don't like people with guns hanging around me, alright?" The Doctor bit out, no subtlety to his rudeness now, and Mace gaped at Martha. She shrugged.

"If you insist." Mace said, his chest puffing and his chin raised as he turned and walked out the room, leaving Martha alone with the Doctor.

Crossing her arms, she looked at him while it seemed he was pointedly ignoring her. "Rose carried a gun."

"Carried, past tense, now she hates them more than me." He replied without looking at Martha. "Which is why she ran from this lot. Too many memories."

"Well, doesn't excuse your rudeness. The colonel's a good man." Martha defended him.

"People with guns are usually the enemy in my books." He countered glancing up before standing up right, pulling his sonic from his pocket. He plucked the ATMOS device up, scanning the underside with his screwdriver.

"You used to work for them, too." She reminded him.

"Didn't have as many guns back then. As he said, a modern UNIT." The Doctor mocked, glancing at her with disapproval. "You seem quite at home."

"If anyone got me used to fight, it's you." She instantly wished she didn't say it. If she could have reached out in the air and snapped the words back she would have. Because he got her the job, but she applied for the military aspect. She could have gone to the science side of things but chose not to.

"Oh, so it's my fault?" He asked her, leaning on the counter as he adjusted his grip on the sonic.

"No, it's not." She said. "But look at me, am I carrying a gun?" She asked him, and he looked her over.

"Suppose not," he relented.

"It's alright for you, you can just come and go. But some of us stay behind. And by being here, on the inside, maybe I stand a chance of making them better." She replied, holding his eye and trying not to smile as he does.

"That's more like Martha Jones." He said.

"I learned from the best." She smiled.

"Well," He said, his ego swelling.

"I meant Rose." She said back, laughing at the way his face fell. "She doesn't still hate me, does she? Sounded nice enough on the phone."

"She never hated you." He said honestly. "Back then I was stupid, and we were new."

Martha laughed. "Only been a year." She teased.

"For you maybe. Been five for us." He replied, and she felt her eyes go wide.

"And you still aren't married?" She asked, glancing at his naked left hand.

"Oh, don't you start." He said, the whine in his voice making it oh so tempting to keep goading him.

"Oi, you lot!" Donna Noble said, standing in the door way with a binder in her hand looking smug. Eerily smug. Doctor smug, and Martha braced herself for what the fiery Ginger was gonna say.


	9. The Sontaran Stratagem pt 2

Donna understood. It was all a little too much for her, being here on Earth, finding out that that wonderful thing they've put in all the cars might not be so wonderful after all. How hadn't _that_ come up in all the conspiracy theories she'd read on the Internet? Because honestly, not a half hour with this lot and she could suddenly see how suspicious it was.

But Rose was so used to alien she practically was one, so Donna knew the weirdness of it all didn't scare her away. It was the emotional scars.

She knew she'd never understand completely what Rose went through, nor that she'd likely ever be told. But she did understand the need to put space between herself and the reminder. Donna did it after Lance, killing way more spiders than she had before and finding anything to do with weddings driving her to the other side of the street. With her Dad, anything that reminded her of him was quickly turned away from. Had she been through what they had been, well, Donna was sure she'd have been back in the TARDIS and refusing to come out until the military went away.

So as she let herself into the factory office, the one place she thought that maybe she might be useful, how ever unlikely that was, she fought the urge to call Rose and make sure she was okay.

And found herself succeeding when she was drawn to the files. Such a habit, wanting to make sure the files were in the right order, and she noticed right off that they weren't.

"Bloody dolts. It's simple!" She growled to herself as she started grabbing the blue binders and rearranging them properly without really thinking about it. When one felt light she stopped short. Empty? No, it was labeled.

"Sick days?" She said, taking the binder and opening it, seeing not a single sheet of paper inside. Can't be right, not possible. She scanned the other binders, now paying more attention to what they said than before, trying to find one over stuffed with paper. When it proved fruitless she searched the filing cabinets, looking for the archived sheets that simply had to be there. There was no way that in a three year span, the time in which most places should keep personnel files and the like, that no one got ill.

She found nothing.

And smiled. Beamed, really, as she grabbed the empty binder and calmly walked out of the office despite the sheer excitement she felt. She made her way back to where she left the Doctor, a beat of concern drumming up for a moment when she saw the Doctor was alone with Martha. It lasted until she heard Martha teasing him about not being married.

"Oi, you lot." She got their attention, holding the binder in her hands in such a way that it swung a little as she grinned at the confusion on the Doctor's face, the near matching on on Martha's. "All your storm troopers and your sonics. You're rubbish. Should've come with me." She said as she partially strutted into the room.

"Why, where've you been?" The the Doctor asked, standing upright.

"Personnel. That's where the weird stuff's happening, in the paperwork. 'Cause I spent years working as a temp, I can find my way round an office blindfolded, and the first thing I noticed is an empty file." She said. Let them believe she was  _that_  good. They'd never know it would have been impossible to find if she hadn't started organizing.

"Why, what's inside? Or, what's not inside?" The Doctor asked as he pocketed his sonic screwdriver.

"Sick days, there aren't any. Hundreds of people working here, and no one's sick." She said, seeing the colonel rejoin them, looking disbelieving as Martha looked confused. "Not one hangover, man flu, sneaky little shopping trip, nothing. Not ever. They don't get ill."

"That can't be right," The Colonel insisted as he took the file like there was actually something to flip through.

"You've been checking out the building, should've been checking out the work force." Donna said, crossing her arms.

"I can see why he likes you," Martha said sincerely. "You are good."

Donna beamed, pointing at herself. "Super temp." She said, proud that her menial skills in office work actually paid off somehow.

"Doctor Jones, set up a medical post, start examining the workers. I'll get them sent through." He ordered before turning and walking off, the Doctor following him down the corridor.

"Come on, Donna. You can give me a hand." Martha suggested, and without anything else to do at this point, Donna couldn't see the harm.

Though she was admittedly suspicious. She didn't have a reason to be, she hadn't gotten the vibe from Rose that she disliked Martha, or didn't trust her. The problem was that Martha didn't know her, and judging by the diamond earrings in Martha's ears, the uniform, the title of doctor, Donna knew that the only thing they likely had in common was the Doctor himself. So why, when Martha had to have known that temp didn't mean anything medical, did she want Donna's help?

She allowed the beautiful young woman to lead her back to the office she was in, helping her out by quickly finding the personnel files of all the employees, handing them over one by one, watching as Martha sat at the desk and started to look through them. After not finding anymore employee information, Donna picked up another chair and sat near the desk. She studied Martha for a moment, trying to see if she could find the angle that this woman was working from. She obviously wanted to get them alone, so what was she playing at?

"You think I should warn my mum?" Donna asked, "About the ATMOS in her car?" She added when she noticed the slight lift of Martha's head.

"Better safe than sorry." She replied, flashing Donna a grin.

"I'll giver her a call." Donna said, reaching for her phone, making it seem as though she was going to do that right then.

"Donna," Martha said abruptly, looking her right in the eye. "Do they know where you are, your family? I mean, that you're traveling with the Doctor and Rose?"

And there it was, the angle. "Not really," Donna admitted. "My granddad sorta waved us off. Well, me and the Doctor anyway, Rose was flying. I didn't have time to explain."

"You just left him behind?" Martha asked, incredulously.

"Well, s'not like I coulda just picked him up." Donna replied. "He doesn't know exactly what's going on, but, he knows enough. I think." Donna clarified, watching Martha chew her bottom lip. "What is it?" She asked her, a softness coming over her as she realized how difficult this must be to talk about despite it not really being Martha's business.

"I didn't tell my family, kept it all so secret. And it almost destroyed them."

That caught Donna up short. Of all the things Martha could have said, the dangers, the monsters, maybe even the daft notion of crushing on an alien, she hadn't expected her to say that.

"In what way?" Donna asked, though she wasn't sure she wanted to know the answer.

"They ended up imprisoned." She replied, and a cold chill shot over Donna's spin. "They were tortured, my mom, my sister, my dad. It wasn't the Doctor's fault, but … you need to be careful. 'Cause you know the Doctor, he's wonderful. He's brilliant. But he's like fire: stand too close, and people get burnt."

"Not everyone." Donna replied softly.

"No?" Martha asked. "'Cause even Rose has suffered since being with him. And she may love him, and there are plenty of reasons she should, but she's lost more than she's gained. She'll just never let on."

"Why are you saying this?" Donna asked, a little angry for her new friends but also terrified at the truth Martha seemed to be speaking.

"Because while I would do it all again, I know there are things I'd do different. And it's more than being silly and falling for him, I wouldn't keep anyone in the dark. I'd have told someone."

And with that, Martha picked up the binders, leaving Donna in the room by herself.

She remembered Rose saying that the Doctor had let her say goodbye to her Mum when they first met. That she couldn't do Christmas dinner because it would be the first without said Mum. But she didn't know what happened, not really. Maybe she should find out.

But first, Donna realized, there was someone she had to see first.

She got up, moving down the corridors, asking black uniforms if they'd seen the Doctor, all helpfully pointing her in the right directions, eventually leading her to a garage type area within the warehouse where she found him by a jeep. The colonel was walking away, and the Doctor was looking about as if maybe he was a little lost.

"Doctor, " She called to him, and he perked up as he turned toward her.

"Oh, just in time! Come on, we're going to the country. Fresh air and geniuses, what more could you ask for?" He asked her as he put his hands in his pockets.

"I'm not coming with you." She let slip, and watched as the light in his eye vanished. "I'm going home."

"Really?" He asked, the disappointment clear in his voice if not in his eyes, and Donna felt bad.

"I've got to," She said, about to explain why, when she noticed something in him shift.

"Well, if that's what you want." He said, adjusting his posture. "I mean, it's a bit soon, and Rose will be devastated. There were so many places we could've taken you. The fifteenth Broken Moon of the Medusa Cascade," He started, sounding as if he was trying to seduce her, maybe even looking a little like it. And Donna bit her tongue as he named off all these planets and places, trying not to laugh because honestly, did he really think she meant for good? Without saying goodbye to Rose? And was this how he won that poor girl's heart, because if this was his idea of seduction, then Rose probably could've done better. Maybe goof with the big ears was more convincing, or maybe Donna was just unable to see the alien in such a way, making the whole thing horribly amusing. But to her benefit, Donna remained stoic the whole time. Well, almost. " Thank you, Donna Noble." The daft thing continued. "It's been brilliant. You've saved our lives in so many ways, brought a spark back I worried was gone for good in my precious girl, and …." It was then her smile cracked. "You're just popping home for a visit, that's what you mean." He said, finally getting it.

"You dumbo," She said, still not laughing but grinning like a fiend.

"And then you're coming back," He nodded, clearly feeling like the biggest idiot this side of the Universe.

"Know what you are?" She teased. "A great big outer-space dunce."

"Don't tell Rose," He asked, "Please."

"Maybe. If you give me a lift." Donna said after hearing a young soldier telling the Doctor they were ready when he was.

"Done," He said, and he led her over to the jeep.

She giggled softly, keeping it all to herself until she just couldn't. Laughing a little louder, she looked to the Doctor. "Broken moon of what?" She asked.

His ears turned bright read, the blush creeping down his cheeks, and he his his face behind his hands for a moment. "I know, I know." He chastised himself as they drove away.

* * *

Rose carried the bouquet of her name sake in yellow down the small paved path, past the water feature that interrupted the straight line to the giant black marble wall. It spanned far too wide, with a height about a foot taller than her. Thousands of names were etched over the semi-circle structure, the top of the middle slate reading  _Never Forgotten_.

War memorials shouldn't be made up of so many civilian names, but Rose knew that was what most of them were. Converted to Cybermen, shot by Daleks, so many people who didn't do anything but go about their day only to be faced with the worst monsters of the known Universe.

She moved slowly down the Canary Wharf memorial, reading the names with a sort of detachment as she made her way alphabetically. She stopped and grazed her fingers along  _Micheal Smith_ , haven't really considered that he'd be considered among the dead since he had already been gone a couple months by the time the battle happened. She moved on, making her way to the end of the Ts and stopping.

Something about seeing her name on something like a grave made a chill run down her spin. Her eyes were drawn to it, her mind making her think it stood out a little more than the others. Would there be another marker in the Universe when she and the Doctor eventually end, or will this be the only testament to her existence? Shaking the thought from her mind, she shifted her eyes two spots up, seeing her mother's name. She took a shaky breath, setting the flowers at the base of the monument, backing up and sitting on a bench where she could still see the name clearly.

"Not even really dead to my knowledge, but flowers seemed appropriate." She said to the stone, wringing her hands. "I know yellow's not your favorite, but they didn't have any pink ones that looked worthy of buying, and I wasn't about to get them already turning brown." She snorted. "Not like you'd really know." She narrowed her gaze. "I wonder if you can hear me though, somehow. Well, if you can, you should know you were right. I did become like him, so much like him. And it hasn't even been a decade and I'm not the Rose you knew." She chuckled sadly, "Not even human, that's what you said. Right about that too, you were. Mother knows best. And, God, I miss you more each time I think on that, because it's been hell 'n' heaven all at once. And I don't come back, because with you gone, and Mick's, there's no reason. My home's changed, it changed before I even knew it. Oh Mum, if you could see me now … well, you'd ask what alien cream I was using to keep the wrinkles away and likely complain that I've gotten too thin. And today, well, you'd probably notice that I'm …," She looked at her feet. "I thought the worst thing I'd have to deal with today was Martha, and that didn't seem so bad. But UNIT? Not like you know who that is, but, well, it all circles back, doesn't it? I've changed, changed in ways I'm sure even you couldn't've imagined. And it's a reminder, them, of just how far from myself I've strayed. Just how human I'm not." She trailed off, thinking a little too much on the year that never was.

She heard the footsteps coming up behind her and beside her but ignored them both. Her mind was lingering more on Sarah Jane and Tim than it normally did when she reflected on that time. Normally it was the death, the lives she took, but for some reason she was remembering the ones she saved, her heart constricting. Maybe Jackie could hear her somehow, maybe a mother's love was helping her daughter across Universes, reminding her that she did more good than bad and she was proud. Rose would like to believe that, that her mother would be proud.

"Mind if I sit?" A sheepish sounding man asked. Rose glanced up, seeing the skinny man with big eyes and a predominate nose point to the seat beside her. She nodded once, and he sat down, staring at the memorial. "Who'd you lose?" He asked as he shoved his hands in his hoodie pockets.

"My mum," She said. "You?"

"My mum, too." He admitted. "She was shopping, my Dad was home. They moved here after I got my job at the hospital because, well, mum always liked the idea of the city. Now Dad can't bare to leave." He turned to Rose. "What about your Mum?"

Rose grinned a touch. "Wrong place, wrong time. Or maybe right, I never know how to look at it." She said, ignoring the man's confusion. "Never mind me," She said with a wave. "Anyway, I should probably be going. Need to make sure my boyfriend's staying out of trouble." She said, getting to her feet.

The man snorted. "Good luck with that." He said, and Rose left it alone. Well, almost, because she had to look over her shoulder as she walked away. What she saw made her pause. Not because the man, whoever he was, was looking after her. His eyes were on the monument. It was the blonde man that approached the monument and picked up the yellow roses she had left there. She watched as he strode away, ignoring the glance of the man Rose spoke to as he moved steadily down the path.

Then disappeared.

Rose blinked, her mind racing without her permission. She closed her eyes, willing it to slow and stop. When her head finally stopped aching, she got out her phone, seeing a text from Donna informing her that she went home for a visit. And that the Doctor was a dunce, no further explanation. Shaking her head, Rose asked Donna for her address, got a quick reply, and then set about making her way to Chiswick.

* * *

 

The jeep pulled up at the end of Donna's street, and the Doctor climbed out to allow her to do the same.

"I'll see you back at the factory, yeah?" She asked him as she held on to the door as if she were worried the soldier would drive off without him.

"Could you let Rose know where you are?" He asked. "Don't want her to worry."

"What about you, how will you get a hold of her if you need her?" Donna asked, only just realizing that she was essentially his connection to his partner.

"I'll find a way if I need to," He replied with confidence. "Enjoy your visit," He said as he started to climb back into the jeep.

"And you be careful," Donna scolded before turning away from the jeep as it drove off. She took a moment to shoot off a quick message to Rose, tucking her phone away after it sent and looking around as she started walking down the street.

It hadn't been that long since she left with them, she remembered glimpsing the date on all those computer monitors at the factory, but everything seemed like she'd been gone ages. She thought of everything she'd done, everything she'd seen. The years she'd traveled to, the people she met, and she did all that in a matter of a couple of days. People were walking down the streets, a neighbor noted her absence, and Donna could only smile to herself until she spotted her Granddad walking down the drive. She stopped, feeling the tears well and her throat tighten at such a simple sight.

He set the bag of rubbish down at the end, turned, and stopped. They stared at each other, and after a beat, she could see him beckoning her over. And she ran, the distance between them disappearing quickly. A breath later, she was in his arms, and she wasn't sure she ever wanted to let go.

"Didn't expect you so soon," He said, his voice clouded with emotions.

"Bad thing?" Donna asked, and she felt him shake his head.

"Come in, come in, get some tea, tell me all about it." He encouraged, and she followed him back in the house.

They headed into the kitchen and he promptly made her and himself a cup of tea, reminding Donna that she had things for him and her mother back on the TARDIS.

Her Granddad sat the mug down in front of her just as she got a text on her phone. She read it quick, seeing it was Rose, and replying with her mother's address, and then tucked it away to see her Granddad grinning.

"So you found him." He said.

"Yeah," She grinned. "Not exactly how I imagined, but I did."

"And you and he …?" Her Granddad asked.

"No!" Donna said quickly. "No, it's nothing like that. You wouldn't have seen her, but his partner, wife-like-girlfriend, she's with us too."

"And they're … they're alien are they?" He asked for clarification.

"He is, yeah." She said, taking a sip of her tea. Not quite as good as TARDIS tea, but she wasn't complaining.

"I said they were real," He said as if Donna ever denied him. Which, maybe she did once, but hardly since she'd met the Doctor. "I just didn't expect them in a little blue box." He said thoughtfully.

"It's bigger on the inside." She said with a smirk and lift of her shoulder.

"Should be, three of you living in there." He retorted, grinning as she laughed. "And you've seen things, huh?"

"Oh Gramps, I wish I could tell you, but there are no words. I've seen things, terrifying things, beautiful things. I've breathed different air, stood on different ground. And it's so much better than any holiday we could ever go on but it's also scarier. I wish there were words."

Her Granddad looked worried, rolling the mug in his hands. "But is it safe? This … Doctor, are you safe with him and his, what did you call her? Partner?"

Donna grinned. "I trust them with my life."

"Hold up, I thought that was my job." He countered, his brow wrinkling though there was a grin playing on his lips.

"You still come first." Donna said with a wink. "But they'd never let anything happen to me, promise." She assured him.

He was about to say something when the doorbell chimed. "Well who could that be?" He said, getting up and going to answer the door. Donna waited, listening as he opened the door.

"Hi, I'm looking for Donna," Rose's voice came through.

"In here, Rose," Donna called out, and she heard her Granddad welcome her inside and shut the door. A beat later he was leading Rose into the kitchen. "You alright?" Donna asked her as her Granddad pulled out a chair for her friend.

"Yeah," Rose nodded. "Just couldn't be there, you know?"

Donna nodded.

"I'm Wilfred, Wilfred Mott by the way," Her Granddad said as he sat back down, offering his hand to Rose. "I'm Donna's Granddad, if you can believe it."

"Rose Tyler," She replied with a smile, tongue between her teeth and charming Donna's granddad seemingly instantly. "I feel like we've met before."

"Maybe at the wedding?" Donna suggested.

"Oh, maybe." Rose said.

"You must be the alien's wife." Granddad said, and Donna laughed as Rose did.

"Sorta, yes. I see that Donna's been telling you about us."

"Felt it best," Donna said, getting Rose's attention. "Martha said, well, she mentioned that she hadn't said anything."

"Yeah, best you do." Rose nodded. "The Doctor's a rubbish pilot sometimes, and when I first started traveling with him he landed me back a year after I was gone."

"Well what ever you do, don't tell your mother," Granddad warned Donna, turning away from their guest.

"I dunno." Donna replied. "I mean, this is massive. Sort of not fair if she doesn't know."

"Doesn't know what?" Her mother entered from the back garden carrying a laundry basket on her hip. "And where've you been these past few days, lady? After that silly little trick with the car keys I phone Veera. She said she hadn't seen hide nor hair of you."

"I've just been traveling." Donna said, glancing at Rose who smirked sadly.

"Oh hark at her." Her mother continued, seeming oblivious to Rose's presence as she set the laundry on the table. "Are you staying for tea, 'cause I haven't got anything in."

"Likely not," Donna replied, looking up at her mother who stopped mid fold and stared at Rose.

"I know you." She said firmly.

"This is Rose, I've been traveling with her." Donna offered quickly, and Rose gave a slight wave.

"You were at the wedding," Her mother's brow narrowed.

"Yeah, we met at HC Clements," Donna replied, hoping her mother would buy it.

"Well you look like should still be in school, so if you've popped off without saying anything to your Mum …."

"Don't worry," Rose said with a sly grin, "I know all about the consequences of not saying anything."

Donna smiled, coughing a little to clear it before she met her Granddad's eye.

"Either way, I've got nothing in for tea, been trying to keep your Granddad on a macrobiotic diet." Her mother started, and while she must for forgotten Donna already knew all this she let her mother ramble. Because it was easier than trying to stop her, and the fact that she was distracted from how she knew Rose was probably best for now, even if the ramble started to veer toward "how do you have the money to travel" and "hope this will get you a job or at least a place to live".

After a time, the door bell rang again, and seeing this opportunity to escape her mother's rambling, tilted her head and getting Rose to join her lest she become victim of a Q&A that she really shouldn't be sucked in to.

"Sorry about that," Donna whispered to her as they went for the front door.

"Don't worry about it." Rose replied quietly. "Just be glad the Doctor's not here. May have only been a few days, but I have a feeling that if your mother knew he was involved she'd rival my mother's reaction to my traveling with him."

"Which was," Donna asked, hand on the door knob.

"She slapped him. Left a mark." Rose replied, and Donna snorted as she opened the door.

On the other side stood the Doctor, looking like he could use a good cup of tea or a really stiff drink.

"You would not believe the day I am having." He said, brightening slightly as his eyes fell on Rose. "Oh, hello Sweetheart, fancy meeting you here."

* * *

 

"Blimey, you look like hell," Rose said as she stepped up to him, wrapping her arms around the Doctor's neck and feeling him relax before she even had her hands touching his skin.

"Nearly being dunked in the river while trapped inside a locked, bullet proof vehicle will do that." He replied, and she was flooded with apologies, love, sheer relief to be in her arms.

"I'll requisition us a vehicle," a young looking UNIT soldier said from behind the Doctor.

He stepped out of Rose's embrace, look sternly at him. "Anything without ATMOS. And Ross, don't point your gun at people." He said before heading back down the front step and heading to the blue car parked in the drive. He bent down, looking for something underneath.

"Should I call Martha?" Donna asked.

Rose shrugged, "Can't hurt. Got the number?" She asked, and Donna shook her head. Handing her friend her phone, Rose let Donna handle the calling while she joined the Doctor. "What are you looking for?"

"The ATMOS device." The Doctor replied, giving her a quick touch to tell her what she may have missed. "More dangerous than we could have known. It's being controlled by the Sontarans."

"Who are they?" Rose asked. As the Doctor ran around to the front of the car and opened the hood.

"Alien race born and bred for warfare." He replied as Wilfred came up to them.

"Is it him? Is it the Doctor." He said as he walked, stopping beside Rose and looking at the Doctor. "It's you."

"It's me," the Doctor said with a quick grin up at Wilfred.

"You're the one from the wedding, the one who did the thing to the Robots after the ornaments." He said, pointing at the Doctor who stopped to really have a look at Donna's Granddad.

"Yeah, suppose I did." He said.

"Wilf, Wilfred Mott, sir," He introduced himself, offering his hand to the Doctor. "You're one of them aliens."

"Well, yeah, but don't shout it out." The Doctor grinned, shaking Wilf's hand. "Nice to meet you." He replied.

"Oh, an alien hand." Wilfred replied as the Doctor pulled back, looking at the hand that was just shaken. "You didn't feel like that," He said to Rose.

"Not an alien," She replied with a grin, tongue between her teeth as Donna came around the other side to stand by the Doctor.

"She's not answering," Donna said. Lowering the phone to end the call and hitting redial. "What's a Sontoran?" She asked.

"Sontaran," The Doctor corrected, returning his attention mostly to the car in front of him, searching for something. "And it's got to be more to it, they can't be just remote controlling the cars. That's not enough."

"You said they're warriors," Rose said. "Maybe the ATMOS is converting the CO into some sorta, I dunno, weapon? Like a gas, or …."

"CO2," the Doctor corrected. "And it's possible, but I'm not sure how." He looked to Donna.

"Hold on," She said, lifting a finger to silence him. There was a pause. "Martha, it's Donna actually. But hold on, let me give you to the Doctor." She handed the Doctor the phone, and he paced away from them, rambling on about warnings to pass along. "See anything?" Donna asked her as she came up beside Rose.

"No idea what I'm looking for." She admitted, crossing her arms and shaking her head. "Might be able to put things together faster but I'm worse than useless when it comes to mechanics."

The Doctor returned, handing Rose her phone before pulling out his Sonic and bending over the car engine. He started hovering the screwdriver over it, the blue light glowing and the familiar hum sounding odd against the metal.

"But you tried that back at the factory," Donna said, hands on her hips. "You didn't find anything."

"Yeah, but now I know it's Sontaran. I know what I'm looking for." He replied. Before anyone could ask what that was a fairly large quantity of spike came from a piece on the engine that Rose didn't find familiar. As they popped out, she put a hand on the Doctor's arm, momentarily trying to push him back despite the danger being little. Startled, she figured.

"Woah, it's a temporal pocket!" He cried out triumphantly, startling Donna a little. "I knew there was something else in there. It's hidden just a second out of sync with real time."

"Why?" Rose asked.

"Something likely set to trigger at a certain time. Hiding something from anyone who wants to tamper with it, find out how the device works." The Doctor replied.

"Like you?" Rose asked. "But 's not like an average human would tamper with it in like that."

He turned toward her. "Fifty-two people around the world died at the exact same time. Something tells me that those fifty-two people weren't just random victims. Some, maybe, but it's so few."

"And on a planet with billions, a few hundred still wouldn't look suspicious."

"Exactly," The Doctor said, his expression flat, but his eyes deadly serious. "So why only fifty-two? What did those people do to be the test subjects? I figured out the truth behind ATMOS, and Ross and I almost ended up in the river."

"May not know the details, but they were on to something." Rose nodded, understanding.

"I don't know," Donna's mother's voice startled Rose, and maybe the Doctor too, but he didn't show it, turning his attention back to the car. "Men and their cars. Sometimes I think if I was a car … oh!" She stopped short, and when Rose looked up she found Missus Noble glaring at the Doctor. "It's you." She sneered.

"Yeah, that's me." He said, waving and not looking up. As Donna's mother crossed her arms and opened her mouth to say something, smoke started hissing out of the spikes attached to the car engine. "Get back," The Doctor said, pushing everyone in his arms reach, Rose included, away from the car. He pointed the sonic at the car with a fierce intensity usually reserved for staring down an enemy, focusing until the car sparked and sputtered and the smoke stopped. "That'll stop it," he said with confidence as he rushed over, fanning the smoke away and looking at the car.

"I knew he was trouble, he went and blew up the car!" Missus Noble growled. "Who is he, anyway? What sort of doctor blows up cars?"

"Not now, Mum." Donna snapped back.

"Oh, should I make an appointment?" Her mother rolled her eyes before stalking back toward the house. Rose heard the front door slam, and while it wasn't entirely unexpected, she still jumped at the sound.

"That wasn't just exhaust fumes," The Doctor said, looking to Rose with concern. "You might be right, it may be making some kind of gas because it smells artificial."

"Dangerous?" Rose asked.

"Oh yes," The Doctor replied with wide eyes and a tight jaw.

"But that device is in every car on Earth," Donna said in disbelief, looking up and down the street.

Wilf moved around to the driver's side of the car. "It's not safe, I'm gonna get it off the street." He said, climbing into the car.

No sooner did he have the door shut, smoke started rising from behind the car.

"Turn it off!" Donna shouted as Rose and the Doctor moved to the back of the car, staring at the smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe. "Granddad, get out of there." She started banging on the windows and pulling on the car door, nothing budging as Wilf looked more and more scared.

The smoke started to fill the inside of the car as well, and the Doctor rushed to the driver's side, sonic out, attempting to unlock it. "It won't open," He said.

Rose rushed around the side, looking around them and noting the stone wall lining front garden. They weren't plastered down, and she was able to pluck on up while the Doctor looked down the streets. A quick glance afforded Rose the sight of the whole block flooding with smoke.

As quick as she could, she darted to the front of the car, showing Wilf the stone. He nodded, ducking and covering his head while choking on the gas inside. Gripping the stone with both hands, Rose used all her force to shatter the windshield, smashing a big enough hole for Wilf to climb through. She helped, using her arms to cover the small shards of glass on the window from to keep him from cutting up his knees and legs. She winced, gritting her teeth as the shards pierced her skin under Wilf's weight.

"What in blazes!" Rose heard Donna's mother cry out, glancing through blurred eyes to see the woman wasn't so much affront by the damage to the car as she was by the world clouding in smoke. A second later she started coughing.

"Go, get inside the house," The Doctor waved them along. "Just try and close off the doors and windows." He instructed, helping Wilf the rest of the way off the car. He grabbed Rose's arm, looking down at it only for a second before taking his sonic to it. She watched the tiny pieces of glass pop out from where they embedded in her skin, and the relief was palatable as she could already feel her arm starting to heal now that the obstructions were clear. It would have taken at least a half hour for the shards to have worked their way out on their own, and she suspected the Doctor remembered this from the last time such an incident happened.

A black cab pulled up a few feet away, and the young UNIT soldier, Ross, popped out. "Doctor, this is all I could find that didn't have ATMOS." He said.

The Doctor took Rose's hand. "Donna, you coming?" He asked her.

She nodded. "Yeah."

"Donna! Don't go," Her mother shouted as the trio made their way to the cab. "Look what happens every time that Doctor appears. Stay with us, please."

"Don't listen to her," Wilf countered. "You go with them, you go put a stop to this."

And Rose looked over her shoulder to see the momentary guilt in Donna's eyes before she became determined. Squaring her shoulders, Donna climbed into the front of the cab with Ross, and the Doctor opened the door for Rose to scoot in first."

"Back to the factory." The Doctor said at once, and with that, they were off.


	10. The Poison Sky pt 1

The black cab pulled up outside the building where they had been before, the ATMOS factory, and Rose, the Doctor, and Donna jumped out. Rose couldn't tell if it was better or worse here than on Donna's street, the air thick with smoke to the point that it was hard to see more than a few feet in front of her.

"Ross, look after yourself, get inside the building." He said to the UNIT officer who drove them in the borrowed black cab, and the young man acknowledged him before getting on his radio while following the Doctor's suggestions.

"The air is disgusting," Donna coughed as she came up beside them.

"It's not so bad for me," The Doctor replied, turning to Donna and putting her hand on her shoulder. "Go on, get inside the TARDIS, you'll be safe there."

"What about you two?" She asked, and the Doctor turned to Rose.

For her part, her lungs were burning but she didn't cough. Instead of choking like the others, it just seared, and it made Rose wonder if that's what the Doctor felt.

"'M fine," She said, waving it off.

"Then it looks like you and I are going to be stopping a war." He said to her.

"Better than starting one, did that once or twice by mistake," She said, hoping humor would fight the pain, but it didn't. She gave Donna a quick hug, "be careful." She said.

"You too, both of you." Donna replied and she turned and headed for the TARDIS.

Grabbing Rose's hand, the Doctor lead her to the field base housed in the giant black truck, and pulled her inside.

"Right then, here we are." The Doctor announced their arrival. "Whatever you do, Colonel Mace, do not engage the Sontarans in battle. There is nothing they like better than a war. Leave them to us." The Doctor said, and Rose quirked an eyebrow that she hoped the Colonel didn't see.

After all, she was the Bad Wolf, and if her nightmares, if her past actions in some cases were anything to go by, she wasn't exactly one to shy away from confrontation.

"And what are you going to do?" Colonel Mace asked, provoking that very confrontational aspect of her personality, causing her hand to tighten around the Doctor's.

"I've got the TARDIS, I'm gonna get on board their ship." He replied in his smug, Doctor way that made Rose smile. They turned to leave together, heading back outside when he stopped short, and instantly Rose got the feeling of  _wrong_  through the connection. He lowered his walls completely, showing her Martha, the odd or off things he noticed about her, like a problem with her hair and eyes that Rose didn't see, and how she smelled bad. Off. Rose couldn't pick up on it, but she trusted the Doctor's assessment. " _Clone,"_  He told her through their connection before smiling at the apparently fake Martha. "Come on," he said to her with an encouraging grin, and the three of them went back outside.

" _What do you mean, clone?_ " Rose asked him as they headed toward the alley where the TARDIS was parked, the smoke so thick she could only see the outline of the alley entrance.

" _Not her. I don't know why they would, but the Sontarans have cloned her._ " He replied.

" _You sure it's their doing?_ " Rose asked, glancing up at him.

His eyes said it all: no, he wasn't sure. Unsettling as that was, it was nothing compared to entering the alley, the smoke density not being nearly as bad, only to find the TARDIS gone.

"You haven't started giving Donna lessons, have you?" She asked, looking at the empty spot.

"No, she didn't dematerialize," The Doctor said, tongue poking out in the air like a snake. "Taste that, in the air. That sort of metal tang." He said, gesturing about.

"All I taste is smoke." Rose countered.

"Yes, well, smoke with a hint of metal tang. It's teleport exchange. It's the Sontarans, they've taken it." He started breathe heavily, his eyes going wide, but there was something off about it. She could feel the underlying panic that accompanied the rage, but it was so strong to match his tightened jaw. "I'm stuck on Earth like, like an ordinary person. How rubbish is that?" He asked, looking back and forth between Rose and Martha.

"It'll be alright." Rose said, rubbing his arm but not able to really look at him.

"So what do we do?" Martha asked, paying absolutely no mind to Rose. Which, she guessed, wasn't completely out of character, but she didn't even spare her so much as a glance.

"Well, I mean it's shielded, they could never have detected it," The Doctor said, shifting gears so quickly that if Rose hadn't detected the falseness of his panic, she wouldn't have seen it coming. He stared pointedly at Martha, and Rose noted the way she squirmed.

"What?" Martha asked.

"I'm just wondering, have you phoned your family and Tom?" He asked.

"No, what for?" Martha replied.

"The gas." He said. "If Rose wasn't here with me, if she was with her family, I'd have called them by now. Rose, you called your family right?" He asked, looking at her casually.

"'Course I did." She replied, understanding what was happening. Because this wasn't really Martha, so how much like the real one was she? How much did she know.

"I was planning to, absolutely, as soon as I can." Martha smiled, shaking her head as if the thought merely slipped her mind. "What about Donna? I mean, where is she?"

"Oh, she's gone home." The Doctor lied smoothly. "She's not like you, she's not a soldier."

"Neither's Rose." Martha pointed out.

Sold. If anything else about Martha hadn't proved to Rose she was a fake, that one line had. Because during that year that never was, that was essentially what Rose became. She fought along side the rebels where she could, much against Martha's wishes.

"We both know I can never leave his side." Rose said, getting Martha to look at her. It took far to long for her to blink. "Stuck to him, me."

"Right," Martha nodded. "Of course."

"So, ladies, avanti!" The Doctor proclaimed, and it almost made Rose laugh how Martha said nothing on the odd word choice. But she was also too tense, because a clone was a danger, and it made Rose nervous how she tended to walk behind them. Glancing over her shoulder, the Martha clone grinned but not at Rose. At the back of the Doctor's head.

They headed inside the mobile base where the Doctor dropped his grip on Rose's hand and headed for the Colonel. "Change of plan!" He decreed, and the Colonel gave a slight grin.

"Good to have you fighting alongside us, Doctor." He said, giving Rose a slightly bigger grin that she narrowed her gaze at.

"I'm not fighting, I'm not-fighting, as in not-hyphen-fighting." He growled back. "Now, does anyone know what this gas is yet?" He asked the room, eyes falling on the Martha Clone.

"We're working on it." She replied.

"It's harmful, but not lethal until it reaches eighty percent density." A pretty blonde in a green uniform explained to the Doctor. "We're having the first reports of deaths from the center of Tokyo City."

"And who are you?" The Doctor asked, turning toward her.

She saluted, and Rose hid her grin. "Captain Marion Price, sir." She replied.

"Oh, put your hand down, don't salute." He groaned.

"Why don't you just accept it?" Rose asked him, crossing her arms and shifting her weight to one side.

"Because it's the precedent. A salute means I accept authority over a military body." He replied.

"A salute is a sign of respect. One would've thought your ego would love it." She said, smiling with her tongue between her teeth which earned her a glare from the Doctor that didn't quite convince her he was perturbed.

Colonel Mace cleared his throat. "Jordell Bank's traced a signal, Doctor." He said pulling the conversation back where it needed to be. "Coming from 5000 miles above the Earth. We're guessing that's what triggered the cars."

"The Sontaran ship," the Doctor said, moving to a free chair and typing on the computer.

"NATO has gone to Defcon One, we're preparing a strike." The Colonel added, and Rose furrowed her brow.

"Meaning?" She asked.

The Colonel looked at her then away, though it was his mistake as he was met with the fierce gaze of the Doctor. "You can't do that. Nuclear missles won't even scratch the surface."

"Seriously, missiles?" Rose gapped at the Colonel. "Sure it was Torchwood that shot the Sycorax?"

"We were not prepared for such an invasion at that time," He replied. "But I assure you that if we were we'd have never allowed Torchwood to be involved."

"Bittersweet news, that is." Rose said, avoiding the mention of visiting the Canary Wharf memorial while the Doctor work on the computer. "What are you doing there, Doctor?" She asked, leaning over his shoulder. She hadn't learned coding, let alone alien coding, so to her it was nothing more than random letters, numbers, and symbols on the screen that she couldn't comprehend.

"I'm opening a channel so I can speak to the Sontarans." He replied.

"You're not authorized to speak on behalf of Earth," The Colonel replied with a bit of indignation.

"I've got that authority, I earned that a long time ago." He said as he got out his sonic and pointed it at the large screen above.

"That's what you get for saluting so much." Rose said over her shoulder to Colonel.

"I didn't think the companions of the Doctor gave so much input where it wasn't needed." The Colonel countered as the Doctor began addressing the Sontarans.

"Well then, good thing I'm not a companion." Rose replied, turning away from the Colonel to let him maul over that how he liked. She looked up to see a Sontaran's round, potato like head filling the screen.

"Doctor, breathing your last breath?" The potato alien asked in a somewhat monotone voice.

"My God, they're like trolls," The Colonel said, and Rose rolled her head to see him standing slack jawed like an idiot.

"Yeah, loving the diplomacy, thanks." The Doctor sarcastically threw at the Colonel, rolling his eyes with a slight head shake at Rose before turning back to the screen. "So tell me, General Staal, since when did you lot become cowards?"

"How dare you?" The potato general asked, his voice far from threatening in nature, though Rose thought that was what he was going for. The Colonel mumbled something that Rose didn't hear and the Doctor seemed to be ignoring as Staal continued. "Doctor, you impugn my honor."

The Doctor grimaced, propping his feet up on the work station. "Yeah, I'm really glad you didn't say belittle 'cause then I'd have a field day."

"Short are they?" Rose asked.

"Oh, shorter than you without heels," The Doctor replied. "You could use them as an arm rest." He turned back to the screen. "And this lot are cowardly compared to the rest of the might Sontaran race, using poisonous gas. They could blast this planet out of the sky, but instead they're fumigating it while sitting up above and watching it die. Where's the fight in that, Staal? Where's the honor? Or are you lot planning something else, 'cause this isn't normal Sontaran warfare."

"A general would be unwise to reveal his strategy to the opposing forces." Staal retorted, and Rose had to wonder if they were almost Dalek in the way they were emotional programmed. As in the could feel the emotion, but couldn't express it in their tone of voice. She had to admit, it sort of amused her.

"Aaah, war's not going so well then, are we?"

"War?" Rose asked as Staal tried to deny it.

"Between them and the Rutans. It's been raging far out in the stars for fifty-thousand years. All that bloodshed, and what for?"

"For victory!" Staal replied, and he and a bunch of Sontaran's in the background began chanting.

"Give me a break," The Doctor said with an eye roll. He pulled out his sonic and pointed it at the screen, changing it to some cartoon Rose didn't really recognize.

"Doctor, I would seriously recommend that this dialog is handled by official Earth representation." The Colonel said, trying to make the Doctor look at him.

"Oh, cause you've been doing a bang out job handling everything." Rose countered. He gapped at her, and she dared him to say something, feeling the sneer pulling at her lips as her mind started to place the Colonel as a threat to the Doctor. Something in him froze, and he looked away from her quickly as the Doctor returned the screen to the Sontarans.

"Finished?" He sassed, and for a moment Rose could imagine him all big eared and leather speaking the same way.

"You will not be so quick to ridicule when you'll see our prize." Staal said, gesturing to the TARDIS behind him. "Behold! We are the first Sontarans in history to capture a TARDIS."

"Not saying much since you're hardly the first species." Rose said.

"Oh, that's true, Rose, but as prizes go wouldn't you say that's … noble?" He asked, making zero sense at all. "As they say in Latin, Donna nobis pacem."

Donna. Rose had forgotten nearly entirely that she was on the TARDIS, or at least it was very likely the case. She stared at the screen, focusing on the doors, hoping she would see the ginger woman as much as she prayed to every Deity she knew that Donna would stay safely inside. "Did you never wonder about its design?" The Doctor continued. "It's a phone box. A telephonic device for communication. Sort of symbolic, that. Like if only we could communicate, you and I." He said, pointing between the screen and himself, and it suddenly dawned on Rose that he likely connected this conversation to the TARDIS. Smiling she stared at the screen and gave it a wink meant for Donna as she slipped her hands in her pockets and slowly withdrew them, phone in hand.

"All you have communicated is your distress, Doctor." Staal said in a dismissive way.

"Big mistake showing it to me, 'cause I've got the remote control." He teased, wiggling the sonic between his fingers.

Staal ended the conversation, shutting down the channel and causing the screen to go black.

A moment later, Rose's phone rang.

The Doctor took it from her hands. "Donna, I will call you when the time is right, but right now I need you to stay inside the TARDIS and hold tight. I promise you they can't get inside so stay where you are and you'll be fine, got that?" He said, nodding once. "Okay, wait for my call." He hung up on her, handing Rose back her phone.

"And what exactly did all that achieve?" The colonel asked as the Doctor got to his feet and pocketed the Sonic.

"You'd be surprised." The Doctor countered, turning toward the Martha clone. "Results?" He asked, and she nodded once before he snatched it from her hands.

"There's carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides but ten percent unidentified. Some sort of artificial heavy element we can't trace," She said despite him likely being able to read and make sense of the results faster than she could. "You ever seen anything like it?" She asked him, her eyes focusing on him. Rose counted the seconds, finding Martha clone wasn't blinking hardly at all what she should be.

"Must be something the Sontarans invented," The Doctor replied thoughtfully. "This isn't just poison, the need this fas for something else. What could be be?" He asked, looking at the Martha clone with far more interest than he'd ever given the real Martha. She didn't seem to notice.

"Launch grid online and active." Price had said from somewhere else in the room, and the Doctor turned sharply around. Rose did so at a slower rate, seeing the Colonel had moved to stand beside the Captain.

"Positions ladies and gentlemen, Defcon One initiatives in progress."

"What?" She and the Doctor said at once. "I told you not to launch!" The Doctor shouted angrily.

"The gas is at sixty percent density. Eighty percent and people start dying. Doctor, we've got no choice." Mace replied.

"And he keeps telling you it's useless to fight them, so why are you still trying?" Rose asked as Price started the countdown. "Maybe instead of getting all your assets geared toward fight you could have been trying to counter act the gas."

"That would take days, maybe weeks." Mace replied dismissively.

"You're not a scientist, you're a soldier." Rose snapped back, inching closer to him without realizing it. "So maybe you could have assigned someone who might've found a way to clear it. You lot are sittin' on all this ATMOS machines, all the plans in offices, and not once did it occur to you to take the tech there and maybe turn it into something else? No, cause all UNIT does is shoot first and ask later."

The countdown continued, and someone, maybe Price, started naming cities that were coming online.

"And somehow because you're a companion of the Doctor you get to give your opinion? That you're somehow better than me?" He asked her.

She shook her head. "No, mate, I am well below you. I probably have more blood on my hands than you do, alien or otherwise. And I am telling you that in every case I wish I could go back and make a different choice, 'cause I can never get my hands clean. Tell me, Colonel. You get lucky and kill all those Sontarans, you're gonna feel pretty good 'bout yourself, yeah? Well how'll you feel if you fire those missiles and they do nothing but egg 'em on? How good will you feel 'bout yourself if you become responsible for millions of avoidable deaths?"

For a moment, a shadow passed over the Colonel's face, as if her words somehow made an impact on him for the briefest second. Then the countdown entered the last five seconds, and the shadow went away, and he turned pointedly away from her toward the screen that promptly shut off.

"What is it?" He asked. "What happened? Did we launch?" The room remained silent, and Rose glanced at the Doctor to see him eyeing the Martha clone standing a few feet away from him. "Well, did we?" Mace demanded.

"Negative, sir." Price replied. "The launch codes have been wiped, sir. It must be the Sontarans."

"Can we override it?" He asked.

"Trying now, sir." Price replied.

"Why would the Sontarans be so keen to stop the missiles?" The Doctor asked, the room, turning back to Martha clone. "Any ideas?" He asked her.

"How should I know?" She replied, shrugging and seeming shifty under the Doctor's gaze.

Before the stand off could continue, static broke out on the Colonel's communicator. It screamed in the quiet room, and all eyes turned to him as Ross's voice called out, "Enemy within! At arms, Greyhound 40 declaring absolute emergency. Sontarans within factory grounds, east corridor grid six.

Mace got on the radio, "Absolute emergency, declaring Code Red. All troops, Code Red."

"Get them out of there." The Doctor said through his teeth as he whirled around on Mace.

Mace looked the Doctor square in the eye as he got on the radio and said, "All troops, open fire."

"You're mad." Rose said, arms lowering to her sides as her hands balled into fists.

Mace went to respond when his radio crackled. "The guns aren't working. Inform all troops, standard weapons do not work." Gun fire over the communication. "Tell the Doctor it's that Cordolaine signal. He's the only one who can stop them." A loud bang, a soft grunt, then silence.

"Greyhound 40, report, over." Mace asked over the radio, but Rose knew it was fruitless.

As Mace repeated incessantly for Ross to respond, not even using the soldiers name as if he was just a robot, Rose moved away. Taking deep, slow breaths, she flexed her fist. The wall nearby looked like it could use a good dent, if not a hole, and she was trying very, very hard not to be the one to add to the decor.

She heard the Doctor and Mace in the background, the former lecturing, the latter finally calling the retreat. Mention of the gas levels having increased by six percent came from that Price woman, the Doctor and Mace continued to determine why the Sontarans were in the factory, then a beat later she felt the Doctor's hand on her shoulder. His thumb brushed her neck, sending her calm and love.

" _I think our clone is stopping the launch._ " He said to her through her mind. "I need your phone." He said out loud. She took it out of her pocket and handed it to him as he showed her that he was about to enlist Donna. As he took her phone and headed away from everyone, tucking him self into an office, Rose looked around to see that Mace was gone.

* * *

 

Donna was seriously starting to question why she thought traveling with the Doctor and Rose was such a good idea. No sooner was she inside the TARDIS did that strange hand in a jar started glowing. And not long after that she felt a shift in the ship, was jostled around a bit, and peeked outside to see she was now with these potato troll aliens all wrapped up in armor. And yeah, sure, the Doctor let her know in no uncertain terms that he knew she was on what she believed to be a space ship, and had called her from Rose's phone as if to make her feel better, but she didn't.

And her call home didn't help either, because now she was worried for her Granddad, and maybe a bit for her mother. They were scared, but what was worse was that her veteran hero was scared.

So with nothing to take his tone of voice out of her mind, and nothing but her own fear along side his to stew in, Donna sat on the jumpseat. Stared at the glowing hand, and waited for the next step while debating if maybe when this was all done she shouldn't just stay in Chiswick.

Then her phone rang, Rose's name popping up on the screen.

"What's happened, where are you?" Donna answered instead of the normal 'hello' others would deem polite.

"Still on Earth," The Doctor replied, making her heart drop. "But don't worry, I've got my secret weapon."

"Rose?"

"You."

Damn. She wasn't getting out of here anytime soon, then.

"Can't you just zap us down to Earth with that remote thing?" She asked, startled as she felt a happy hum in her mind as if someone was pleased with her. She looked around the ship, the _sentient_  ship, and then at the hand and hoped that the happy hum of acceptance was from the former not the latter.

"Yeah, I haven't got a remote, though I really should." The Doctor said, pausing as a door in the background opened and closed. She thought she heard the faint sounds of Rose's voice. "Yeah, it is. Donna, listen, I need you on that ship. It's why I made them move the TARDIS, and I'm sorry, so sorry, but you're got to go outside."

She stilled. And there were a lot of things that she wanted to shout at the Spaceman, but she took a deep breath and reminded him, "There's Sonterruns out there."

"Sontarans," The pedantic alien corrected her, and she rolled her eyes. "But they'll all be on battle stations right now. They don't walk around having coffee, I can talk you through it."

"But what if they find me?" She asked, her heart starting to pick up speed as she inched closer to the door.

"I know, I'm sorry, I wouldn't ask, but there's nothing else I can do. The whole planet is choking, Donna." He said.

She wanted to argue. She wanted to point out that he had an indestructible girlfriend who was used to this sorta thing, and she could have just as easily gone inside the TARDIS as she had. But Donna didn't. Instead, she sucked in a deep breath, went right up to the door and quietly asked, "What d'you need me to do?"

"The Sontarans are inside the factory which means they've got a teleport link with the ship, but they'll have deadlocked it. I need you to reopen the link."

She wanted to laugh, but refrained. "I can't even mend a fuse." She said, some of the humor of the situation making it into her voice.

"Donna, stop talking about yourself like that. You can do this, I promise." He reassured her.

She opened the doors and quickly closed it again, as quietly as she could, when she saw a singular potato troll standing outside.

"There's a Sonterrun, er, Sontaran." She corrected herself.

"Did he see you?" The Doctor asked

"No, he's got his back to me." She replied. He then went on and explained something about a valve or a vent, something to do with probiotics, though Donna was sure she likely just heard him incorrectly. The main thing she got from his science explanation was to his the potato troll over a hole in it's neck. "He's gonna kill me." She said, because there was no way something that looked like  _that_ had such a stupid weakness.

"I'm sorry, I swear I'm sorry, but you've got to try." He said.

She lowered the phone, closing her eyes, steading her breath and her heartbeats as best she could. When she opened them, her eyes fell on a rubber mallet hanging off the console panel. Striding over to it, Donna picked it up, testing the weight of it in her hand before she opened the TARDIS doors again. As quick as she could she darted out, and whacked the potato troll over the tiny hole in it's neck. He collapsed into a lump on the floor. Lumpy smashed potato troll.

"Back of the neck!" She said triumphantly into the phone.

"Not then, you gotta find the external junction feed to the teleport," The Doctor instructed, his voice betraying that he did feel at least a little pride in what she'd done.

"What's it look like?" She asked, feeling a touch more confident as she closed the TARDIS door and crossed the room.

"A circular panel on the wall. Big symbol on the front like a T with a horizontal line through it, or two Fs back to back." He explained, and she looked around the virtually empty room and found nothing but a door with a circular switch that looked more like child's drawn W.

"Well, there's a door." She told him.

"Should be a switch by the side," He said, and she looked to the circle again. She glanced over at mashed potato troll and saw his hand, then glanced at the switch.

"There is, but it's Sontaran-shaped, you need three fingers." She replied, lifting her hand and comparing the two.

"You've got three fingers," The Doctor said, and that pride from earlier was long gone. She paired her fingers off as if she was attempting to do a Vulcan salute and fitted into the groove of the switch. The door slide open, and she beamed.

"I'm through!" She cheered.

She thought she heard something like a kiss, and for a split second she was about to growl at the Doctor for macking on his girlfriend during such circumstances, but a split second later he said with all sincerity. "Oh you are brilliant, you are."

"Shut up," She deflected, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks as soldiered on.

There was noise in the background again before the Doctor said, "Got to go. Keep the line open." And then he was gone.

"Because I'd really call up a mate and have a chat right now, Dumbo," She said to the phone before taking a breath and continuing on with the mission at hand.


	11. The Poison Sky pt 2

Mace was an idiot that could use a good smack, one which Rose was pleased she hadn't handed out yet despite learning from the best. He wouldn't listen to the Doctor, but somehow she believed he wouldn't listen to anyone with common sense if it contradicted what he thought was a good idea.

An as they gathered outside the factory in their gas masks to look at their barrage of weapons he had laid out for their viewing displeasure, Mace tried to earn the Doctor's approval by showing off his new toys.

"Latest firing stock, what do you think, Doctor?" He asked, lifting the gun and showing it to the Time Lord.

"Are you my mummy?" The Doctor asked, and Rose giggled. She saw him flash a wink at her from behind his mask, and for the second time that day she was reminded of her first Doctor.

"Should I send you to your room?" Rose teased, biting her lip as she remembered the Doctor's threats to the gas mask Zombie.

"Depends, am I going alone?" He countered, and Rose wished she could see Mace's face.

"If you two could concentrate." He said a lot louder than needed, even with the masks. He showed them one of his new guns. "Bullets with a rad-steel coating, no copper surface."

"But the Sontarans've got lasers," The Doctor reiterated. "You can't even see in this fog, the night vision doesn't work."

"Thank you, Doctor. Thank you for your lack of faith. But this time, I'm not listening." Mace replied indignantly.

"Sorry, that would mean you'd have been listening in the first place." Rose said, gesturing about loosely.

"Listening doesn't always mean doing as was advised," Mace replied, pulling off his mask and giving her a glare. She snorted, shaking her head slightly as he went and gave some sort of (supposedly) rousing speech and she reached back for the Doctor's hand.

" _How's Donna_?" She asked him in their minds. She'd been worried for their friend since overhearing the Doctor's earlier conversation over the phone.

" _Haven't checked since Mace came by. Sure she's fine, she's brilliant."_  He replied.

" _That she is,_ " Rose concurred as their physical attention was drawn skyward. Loud engines hovered overhead, and the smoke around them quickly started to clear. The sight before her made Rose feel as though a rock was sitting in the pit of her stomach, and she swallowed back the lump all the bad memories that ship stirred up caused. They took off their gas masks.

"It's the Valiant!" The Doctor exclaimed, almost cheerfully, and it was something she couldn't understand. He was the one imprisoned on it for a year, and yet every time it was so much as mentioned she cringed.

Forgetting for a moment that they were connected, she was taken aback but the warm hug her mind received, and the reassurance that it didn't bother him. He'd been through worse, and he always knew they'd get through that year deep down.

"Carrier Ship Valiant reporting for duty, Doctor!" Mace exclaimed after seeing the smile on the Doctor's face. "With engines strong enough to clear away the smoke."

"Woah, that's brilliant." The Doctor said with a grin and a shake of the head.

"Valiant, fire at will," Mace commanded.

"That's our cue," The Doctor said softly into Rose's ear. She looked up at him puzzled. " _Teleporter is inside the factory, and if we're very lucky we may be able to find the real Martha._ "

Rose looked to where the clone was hovering on the outskirts of the gathering, a tablet in hand that was the only thing she looked at aside from the Doctor. Nodding once, she let the Doctor give her hand a tug and lead her toward the factory. As soon as they passed the Martha clone she was at their heels, watching the Doctor with panic in her eyes.

"Shouldn't we follow the Colonel?" She asked.

"Nah, it'll be the three of us, just like old times." He said, as he let go of Rose's hand and took out his sonic. Rose noted the clone pushing the button again

"Trying to get a high score or something?" She asked, and Martha clone looked at her, puzzled. "You've been glued to that thing."

Martha clone smiled, "Correspondence." She said in way of explanation, and Rose merely smirked as they continued to follow the Doctor.

"What are you doing?" She asked him as they entered the factory.

"Scanning for alien tech," He said, and he glanced at her with a half smile. "Memory lane for you today, isn't it?"

"At least you're finally doing it without building some sort of multi-functioning gadget."

"And what, exactly, would you call the sonic otherwise?" He quipped back, his face the picture of deep concentration while his voice flirted.

"Really is just like old times," Martha clone said with a bit too much bitterness in her tone, that both the Doctor and Rose stopped to look at her. She couldn't quite get the facial expression to match it.

The sonic had a slight change in pitch. "Alien tech, this way," The Doctor gestured, sparing a second to give Rose an eye roll in regards to the clone.

They followed the signal down a couple flights of stairs and around a couple corners until they were well into the basement. The deeper into the building they got, the closer Rose stood by the Doctor, shifting to be a slight step ahead of him should they run into trouble. The Sontarans seemed short, and while they looked strong she certainly took on bigger and stronger in the past. She was sure she could handle them if needed, but the need didn't seem to exist.

"No Sontarans down here," The Doctor noted, maybe so she would ease up a touch. "They can't resist a battle."

"Probably for the best we didn't run into them then, yeah?" Rose said as he rounded a corner and led them through a doorless entry.

"Martha!" Rose exclaimed as she rushed to the side of the conscious woman strapped down to a table like thing. She had something attached to her head, and was donning a hospital gown, likely so her clone could have worn her clothes. The Doctor joined Rose. "She alive?" She asked him as he checked for a pulse.

"Yeah," He said gently, stroking the top of the real Martha's head from around the contraption.

Rose looked over to the clone, catching her withdrawing a gun and raising it to point at the Doctor. Rose stepped between the gun's trajectory and the Time Lord.

"Honestly? A gun?" She asked her.

"And not a one between the two of you. A mistake I'm sure you both regret right about now."

"Not at all," The Doctor said, and Rose glanced over her shoulder to see he didn't even spare her a glance.

"I've been stopping the nuclear threat," The Martha clone said as if that was somehow a bad thing and she was proud of her handy work.

"Doing exactly what I wanted," The Doctor said, coming to stand by Rose for a moment. "I needed to stop the missiles, just as much as the Sontarans. I'm not having Earth start an interstellar war. You're a triple agent."

"When did you know?" The Martha clone asked.

"What, you? Oh right from the start. Pointed you out to Rose right away."

"'S true." She said. "Didn't help that what ever memories of Martha Jones you do have you seem to be bad at reconciling."

"Why, cause you don't have a family to warn? Figured it was just a test."

"Was in a way, but I didn't need that to confirm you were a copy, just to see how much of a copy you were." The Doctor said. "Reduced iris contraction," He listed.

"Too long between blinks," Rose added.

"The smell," The Doctor added, and he and Rose made a face and nodded in sync despite her not really noticing the difference in odor. "You might as well have worn a T-shirt that said 'clone'. Although, maybe not in front of Captain Jack."

"Oh he'd have a field day with that," Rose said.

"Be a fantasy come true for him." The Doctor agreed. "And you remember Jack, don't you? Because you are feeding off her memories. That's why the Sontarans had to protect her, to keep you inside UNIT. Martha Jones is keeping you alive."

In an action quicker than Rose or the Martha cone could process, the Doctor turned around and pulled the device on the real Martha's head. While she bolted up with a scream, hands scrambling for purchase on the Doctor's arms, Rose looked to the cone to see her crumple on the floor in seeming agony. She lost her grip on the gun, and Rose darted over, taking up the weapon and removing the ammunition, tossing it one direction with the gun in the other.

As the Doctor reassured Martha that everything was alright, Rose heard her phone ring. She pulled it out, answering it while keeping her eye on the Martha clone. "Hello."

"Rose, it's Donna. I've got the thing."

"Doctor," She called to him, holding the phone out toward him. "Donna's in place."

"Brilliant," He said as he took the phone from her. "Donna, hi, take the covering off. All the blue switches inside? Yeah, flick them up like a fusebox. That should get the teleport working." He explained as Martha approached her clone.

"Don't touch me," It snapped weakly.

"It's not my fault," Martha consoled. "The Sontarans created you. But you had all my memories."

The clone nodded, and Rose turned to see the Doctor had headed for what she would guess was the teleporter.

"You've got a brother," Martha clone said. "A sister, mother and father."

"And if you don't help, they're all going to die."Martha reminded her.

"Tell us about the gas," The Doctor called from the teleporter where he was doing something to it with his sonic.

"He's the enemy," Martha clone hissed, and Rose realized that she was considered in consequential to the clone, and likely the Sontarans.

"Then tell me." Martha encouraged. "It's not just poison, what is it?"

The Martha clone seemed to consider this, looking uncertain until a wave of pain must have come over her, and she shut her eyes against it.

"Caesofine concentrate." She said quickly. "It's on part of Bosteen, two parts Probic 5."

"Clonefeed!" The Doctor exclaimed as if he should have known.

"Clonefeed?" Rose asked him, moving toward him as she half hugged herself.

"Like amniotic fluid for Sontarans. That's why they're not invading, they're converting the atmosphere." He explained.

"So it's like the Adipose, they're trying to use Earth as a breeding planet." She said.

"Except they don't need humans like the Adipose did, just the planet itself. And one this big, well, they'd make clones in the billions. That's all Sontarans are: clones. Perfect soldiers made on repeat."

An echo over a speaker drew the Doctor's attention, and Rose noted the speaker was her phone, and the voice had been Donna's. He put it to his ear, and then backed away, pushing Rose back with him. "Now!" He called out as he pointed his sonic at the teleporter, and it lit up.

Rose blinked, and Donna was standing inside the pod. A smile broke out over her face, and she laughed with relief as she came over and hugged the Doctor. "Have I ever told you how much I hate you?" She asked before moving to Rose. "He didn't tell you he was sending me up there, did he?"

"No, because he probably knew if he did I'd smack him and go with you." Rose replied as she tightened her arms around Donna for a beat.

"Right," The Doctor said, and the women parted. "TARDIS is back where she should be. On to the next step. Martha, coming with us?" he asked, and Martha came over to them, holding the tablet the clone had been, her engagement ring back in place though she was still wearing her hospital gown.

"What about this nuclear launch thing?" She asked, looking at the tablet screen.

"Just keep pressing N, we want to keep those missiles on the ground." He said as he shrugged off his overcoat and handed it Martha. She took it gratefully, shrugging it on over her bare arms.

The Doctor grinned, then gestured at the teleporter before stepping in first.

"There's two of them," Donna said, and Rose realized she could see the clone. Rose glanced over, seeing the clone was slumped over and not moving. Gone, she supposed, since Martha was no longer hooked up to whatever the machine was.

"Yeah, long story," The Doctor said dismissively as they all joined him inside the teleporter. "Here we go, the old team, back together. Well, the new team." He said with a cheeky grin.

"We're not going back on that ship," Donna said firmly, glaring at the Doctor.

"No, no, no, I needed to get the teleport working so that we could get to …," A whir of the sonic, a bright flash of blinding white light and then they were in a very ostentatious living space with a little, rat-faced twerp pointing a gun at them.

She moved toward him in quick steps, the kid barely having time to babble before she grabbed the gun in one hand, his wrist in the other, and twisted his arm around near to the point of breaking.

"Luke, my partner Rose. Hates guns as much as I do. She'll also not hesitate to break your arm among other things, so behave." He warned as he headed right for a work station, throwing something together with quick but precise movements.

"What are you doing?" Rose asked him.

He glanced at her over his shoulder. "Sontaran ship would take a nuclear missile better than a car would take being hit by a bicycle, so why do they want to stop a launch? Because caesofine gas is volatile." He said.

"So Earth launches a missile, it, what, burns up the gas?" She asked, furrowing her brow as she mind rapidly put it all together.

"Exactly. Ground to air engagement could spark the whole thing."

"So why are we stopping it?" Martha asked.

"Because it's still warfare, and I'll not have Earth take that step when there's a better way." The Doctor said as he pulled a contraption out from beneath the table, attaching his own gizmo to it. "And there is a better way, isn't there Like? Because you were planning a little trip, weren't you?"

"I was promised a new world," The kid in Rose's grip admitted, and his tone made her loosen her grip a bit. "I was lied to," He said with shame.

"But clever you built the terraform equipment to take with you. Ready to build El Mondo Luko could live and breathe the air with this."

"Which is?" Donna asked.

"An atmospheric converter." The Doctor replied, patting the top of the device. "And these things work by launching it's atmosphere conversion gases upward. So with a little jiggery poke, I've made it so when this fires, it's, weellll, why don't we go outside and I'll show you." He said, picking it up and running for the doors.

"Don't try anything stupid." Rose warned the kid before she let him go. He turned around, startling a bit as he caught her eye.

"Yes, ma'am." He said, turning around and quickly following the Doctor and the others outside.

Just as she was a few feet away from the Doctor, he pushed a button on a remote attached to the converter, launching flames skyward.

"Please, please, please," He repeated on a whisper, and Rose gripped his shoulder. He put his hand on hers, gripping it tight as his anxiousness mixed with hers.

The sky lights up, the heat of the flame warming the air to near summer like temperatures. A moment later, the sky cleared to a pristine blue.

The Doctor jumped to his feet, wrapping his arms tightly around Rose as he laughed victoriously. She gripped him back, hearing the twerp call the Doctor a genius before she was distracted by his cheek against hers.

" _I'm sorry,_ " He whispered in his mind. " _It's not over. And to end it …._ " He showed her his plan, pulling back before she could protest. He picked up the convert and ran back in the building.

"Don't you dare!" She yelled after him, sprinting to catch up with him as his long legs and alien speed took him to the mansion quicker than she'd have liked. When she got inside, he was heading into the teleport pod, kneeling down and making adjustments on the converter. "Send me."

"Can't." He said dismissively.

"I can survive it, we both know it, so why're you being difficult 'about this?" She demanded, and the Doctor looked up at her with sad eyes in his stern expression.

"You might survive, but I still can't send you to your death. It's impossible for me, even after all this time. And what's more is that you may survive but we don't know the damage that would be done to your body."

"I've been in explosions before you know that." She countered, moving closer to him.

"Not in the vacuum of space." He countered, getting to his feet as the others entered the room. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry," He said barely louder than a whisper as he cupped her cheek. "And I really hope that Bad Wolf at least gave you some wiggle room so that if I'm killed before your human life should've ended…."

She cupped his cheek, her heart in her throat. "I wouldn't want to live without you." She whispered.

"Oh, nonsense. Someone needs to look after the Old Girl, keep showing Donna the Universe." He said. "Plenty to live for. You just have a fantastic life." He said, stepping closer. "Do it for me. If you can." He added before kissing her deeply, and far too passionately for the audience they had.

"Oi, celebrating is great, but keep that in the bedroom. Got it Spaceman?" Donna's voice broke them apart, and the Doctor stared into Rose's eyes before looking to them with a dazzling smile.

"Quite right, Donna. Thank you. For everything. Truly, you are brilliant." He back up into the teleporter again. "Martha, you too. The three of you ladies, honestly, brilliant. Couldn't have had better company. Luke," He said to the skinny thing who looked flabbergasted. "Do something clever with your life."

"Doctor, please," Rose said as calmly as she could.

He smiled sadly, "Martha and Donna, hold Rose, please." He asked, his hand going to the teleport controls.

"Why?" Donna asked as she and Martha each grabbed one of Rose's arms, tightening their hold as she tried to break free. "Why are you saying goodbye?" Donna asked.

"Sontarans are never defeated. They'll be getting ready for war." He said as he bent to collect the remote, gesturing to the converter with it. "I've recalibrated this or Sontaran air."

"You're gonna ignite them." Martha said with understanding.

"You'll kill yourself." Donna said, making it all too clear that she wasn't pleased with his plan, and Rose felt her grip loosen.

"Just send that thing up, on it's own." Martha suggested frantically. "Put it on a delay or something."

"Or send me!" Rose offered again, trying to shake them off but not wanting to hurt either of them. Donna's grip tightened with the flinch, and it felt as though Martha's military training was well learned but how Rose could barely shift on her hold. At least at half strength.

"I can't." The Doctor said, shaking his head.

"Why not?" Donna protested.

"I've got to give them a choice." He said, tapping at the panel before looking at Rose one last time.

"No, no, don't. Don't! I'll live, let me," But he was gone. She struggled, and they must have let go as he vanished because Rose dropped to the floor.

"Oh my god." Donna said, her voice soft. "He's killed you. He's killed you both."

"What do you mean?" Martha asked.

"Your life is tied to his and he just … just swanned off to his death." Donna said.

Rose trembled. "Yeah," She said. "But he did the right thing."

"Why?" Donna said, kneeling down by Rose and putting her hand on her back. "Why would this have been the right thing?"

Rose met Donna's eye. "He made me believe it was because he wasn't sure what would happen to me, when the truth was he probably knew I'd be fine. He didn't trust me to give them the chance to surrender." Donna looked like she wanted to argue, but Rose shook her head. "He was right to, because it was more than just his life in danger, it was yours. And Martha's, and the whole Earth. And if there is one thing I don't compromise on, it's the safety of those I care about."

"Luke, what are you doing?" Martha asked, pulling Rose's and Donna's attention to the young man as he stood in the teleporter.

"Something clever." He replied, and with a push of a button he was gone and the Doctor was back.

She rushed toward him, smacking him hard on the arm before pulling him into her arms.

Before anything could be said, Donna rushed over as well, followed by Martha, and Rose backed off a bit to allow them the chance to hug him. Admittedly he still looked stunned, even as Donna smacked him on the arm opposite the one Rose had assaulted. They three remained inside the living area until the Doctor seemed to enough composure to pull himself to his feet. They headed outside just as a black UNIT jeep came up the drive, and all Rose could think of was how badly she hoped it wasn't Mace.

* * *

 

The Doctor and Rose entered the TARDIS, Donna still chatting with her family. Martha, having wanted to meet them now that she had changed into old clothes she found on the TARDIS, got stuck explaining everything to them. As Rose walked up the ramp, the Doctor closed the door.

"So are we going to talk about how you almost got yourself killed for nothing, or are we sweeping this under the rug like we used to?" Rose asked, wanting to get the discussion out of the way before they were faced with companions past and present.

"It's not a decision I made lightly." He replied, and she leaned against the console to see him stopped at the top of the ramp with his hands in his pockets.

"It's one you made without me." She countered.

"Rose, you're my partner, not my grunt." He half growled. "I'm not going to send you to your death because it's easier than facing my own. It's not that I made the decision without you, it's that I didn't feel….."

"Don't you  _dare_  say that you didn't feel it was one you had to include me in. I'm tied to you, you alien git! You die, I die. I'm not your grunt when I stop you from doing something reckless, I'm saving both of us."

"Not this time." He shook his head, jaw tight. "There was no way we could have known how you would have reacted to the being exposed …."

"Jack held on to the TARDIS through the Vortex, and he's fine."

"You're not Jack! Rose, you're mortal. And no matter how much we know you would have survived the explosion of that ship, in tact, we'd have had no idea what the damage would have been like." He yelled. And he never yelled, really. Normally when they argued it was quiet anger, with calm tones and a bitter snaps but never a yelling match, not with this body as of late. So she remained silent, staring at him as he ran his hands through his hair and pulled a bit. "You'd die over, and over, repeatedly, with no more than a split second recovery time before you'd suffocate or worse. The pain you experience after you die would be constantly present. What would that do to your brain? Your body? I know you think I didn't trust you to give them a chance, Rose, but I did. I know you would, because I have seen you these last couple years start becoming more diplomatic than destructive as your primary dealing." He exhaled slowly. "I know your instincts are protecting us both, and you can't possibly imagine how much the idea of likely killing you tore me apart. So much so that I was almost unwilling to press the button. In fact, I'm fairly certain I wasn't going to. But all that said, Rose, I love you, and I have never thought of you as a monster. But sometimes there are risks that I still need to take. Because the not knowing … we'd be right back to spending the rest of your life with me, but not me with you. Because had the damage I suspect being in space would've done to you took place, I would lose  _you_. You'd lose everything that made you you."

Rose breathed slowly, looking into his eyes and seeing the scared Time Lord who watched her helplessly as she lost her grip on the lever at Canary Wharf, as she stood with him against four Daleks in New York, prepared to die with him. There was absolutely no dishonesty in his expression as he slowly walked toward her, standing before her like an offering for her to see into his mind so she would know he spoke the truth.

"Just promise me," She said, taking a deep breath. "Promise me next time, we talk about it first. Because I meant that, when I said I don't want to live without you even if it's only for a normal, human life span." She smirked, "You should know that by now. Keep sending me away and I always come back to you."

"Yeah," he said, and she caught the smile that quirked his lips. "Shiver and Shake, Storm and the Wolf, the stuff of legends."

"Starting to become that, aren't we?" She smiled and he hummed in agreement before taking one last step and kissing her sweetly.

"Fight over?" He asked her.

"I suppose." She sighed, rolling her eyes for good measure. He kissed her before she could hide her fear, her twinge of anger, her own self hate. He kissed her harder, deeper, pushing her back against the controls in a desperate attempt to show her she was better than she thought herself to be. She briefly wondered, his previous self being so much on her mind over the course of the day, if snogging him like that and having him remember would have done anything for that body's own self hate. The Doctor laughed in his throat, showing her not for the first time how much he wouldn't have minded if she had.

"Oh, blimey! I should have knocked, sorry." Martha's voice startled them apart, and Rose peeked around the Doctor to see the poor girl didn't know where to look. "You two never … in here. At least, not that I knew of, so I just thought."

"Sorry," They both said as Rose and the Doctor turned different shades of red.

Martha laughed. "It's alright. Technically not the first time I've seen you two going at it like that, though I didn't know it at the time."

"Yeah," Rose said rubbing the back of her neck in such a way that the Doctor chuckled. She glanced up to see his hand falling away from his neck as he smiled.

Martha came up the ramp, looking around at the ship. "So five years for you two." She said as she sat down on the jumpseat. "Everything looks the same: the ship, you two. I almost don't believe you." The TARDIS doors opened again, and Martha stood up. "Have a nice chat with them?" Martha asked, and Donna nodded as she came up beside Rose.

Her eyes were red-rimmed, and she was touching just beneath them as if trying to catch tears. "Yeah. They'll be fine. Don't need me." Donna shrugged before she looked up at Martha. "So, you gonna come with us?"

Martha looked around the ship, "Oh I have missed all this." Martha admitted, and Rose actually found herself hoping she'd say she would. For at least one trip or three. "But, you know, I'm good here." Martha said, and as much as Rose wanted her to stay, she wasn't heartbroken that she declined. Martha wiggled her left hand. "I'm better for having been away, but now I have something to wait for, an adventure this lovely thing could never give me."

The TARDIS doors slammed shut, making them all jump.

"Sorry, didn't realize this thing hated being drafty," Donna apologized.

Rose looked at the ceiling as the Doctor did, then glanced at him. "I can't hear her."

"Me neither." He replied.

The TARDIS then began to shake, tossing them all to the floor or the rail. Rose's eyes fell on the hand, seeing it glowing brightly, the liquid inside bubbling rapidly. She shifted her gaze to Donna, the closest one to the appendage, and noticed the ginger gapping at it. Martha didn't seem to see it.

"Doctor, take me home! Take me home now!" She shouted at him.

He crawled over to hover over Rose as the Time Rotor bobbed. "It's not me." He said. "She's flying us somewhere on her own."


	12. Meanwhile, across the void 1

In another Universe, Jake returned from his jump with the bouquet of yellow roses in his hands while he stared at his feet. He could feel the eyes of the Tyler family and Mickey on him, and it made him squirm.

"Well?" Mickey asked.

"Saw her." He admitted. He considered lying as he stood a few feet behind Rose Tyler while she sat on a bench and chatted with some guy, but that went out the window when he impulsively collected the flowers she'd laid on the memorial.

"And?" Mickey asked. All Jake could do was shake his head. "Oh, for the love of …."

"She was with someone." He protested, looking up and meeting Mickey's eye. "I didn't know if he was someone who traveled with them, and I wasn't about to try and explain anything to her and risk sounding like a loon."

"Why would that even matter, that's not your Universe?" Mickey countered, shifting his arm and wincing as the pain of his dislocated shoulder reminded him why Jake had jumped and not him.

"Because it just did, okay?" He said. "Besides she didn't stay long after I found her, and I was almost out of time anyway." He tried to meet Mickey's eye, but couldn't. "She said something about keeping her boyfriend out of trouble."

Mickey snorted, shaking his head, and Jackie looked like she was torn between a ramble about being right or rant on the idea of Rose having a boyfriend. He could only assume it meant that this Doctor bloke, the one he barely remembered, must be the man in question.

"She was there for you," He said to Jackie. "At some kind of memorial. I saw her from a distance, took me a while to catch up to her, but she left these there for you. I just thought …."

"Thank you, Jake." Jackie said as she took the flowers with tears in her eyes, smelling them with a wistful smile. "I'm going to go check on Tony and Rachel, make sure he hasn't driven her bonkers." She said, speaking of the nanny they hired since she had been spending more and more time at Torchwood.

"I'm going to try the video com again." Mickey said. "Maybe this time I can get something more than an empty TARDIS."

And without another glance at Jake, he turned and headed to his desk.

It was hard sometimes, seeing Rickey's face but knowing it was an entirely different man. A good friend until this point, when the stars started going out and he became so insistent on finding his ex-girlfriend. Not so much the Doctor as Pete kept saying they needed to, but the blonde girl that Mickey left behind willingly.

Jake sighed. His body ached from the jumps, and to be honest the air there was a little strange. All he wanted was sleep, and a promise that he wouldn't have to do all that again.

But he'd settle for the former.


	13. The Doctor's Daughter pt 1

Rose wasn't sure what was the most terrifying part of the experience: the TARDIS flying herself, or that she was very silent about it. She mentally begged, yelled, pleaded with the Old Girl to tell them what was happening, but she remained mum.

"What the hell's it doing?" Donna asked as the Doctor pulled himself up.

Rose followed looking at the controls. Sparks flew from the panel everywhere she and the Doctor attempted to put their hands, and they looked at each other with matching concern. The TARDIS shook again, knocking them back to the floor.

"What ever it is, she's being rebellious." The Doctor said, looking up at the time rotor. "More than usual."

Rose noted the hand pulsing rapidly, glowing a little brighter before it faded. A beat later the TARDIS landed.

She looked to the Doctor who seemed to be getting the massive waves of apologies from the ship, but whether or not he got an explanation for the Old Girl's behavior she wasn't sure. Getting on her feet in time with him, she was slower to get moving again. He was grabbing his long coat and out the doors before she could steady herself.

"You two alright?" She asked, helping Donna to her feet.

"Yeah," Martha said as Donna nodded.

Making sure neither were just going to fall back over, Rose then ran outside to join the Doctor.

"A tunnel," Rose noted, hearing the slight echo of her voice.

"Seems so," He said, taking her hand in his.

Rose nudged what looked like a pipe with her toe. "Strange place for us to land," She said, looking at the alien equipment, the broken bits of machinery on the ground.

"Yeah," he said, glancing over his shoulder toward the TARDIS. "Must have been a reason for it. I know she tends to take us off course quite a bit, and I suspect it's because there's usually somewhere we should be. But that was odd, even for her."

"You're worried 'bout her." It wasn't a question, but the Doctor answered with a nod anyway. Rose lifted their joined hands, pressing the back of his hand to her lips. "She'll be fine." She reassured. "I mean, maybe something broke while she was being teleported and she knew this was the best place to find it. I mean, there's a lost of stuff around."

"Maybe," He said in a way that meant he didn't think that to be the reason at all.

Something loud sounded through the tunnel, echoing off the walls and putting Rose on guard. She let go of the Doctor's hand, shifting to stand in front. Of course, the noise had come from behind.

"Don't move, stay where you are! Drop your weapons." A man yelled. She turned, and hands in the air like the Doctor and their companions as she eyed the six guns pointed at them.

"We're not armed." The Doctor said, turning his hands about. "Look, no weapons. Never any weapons. We're safe so long as you lower your guns." He warned, and Rose glanced over at him. He wasn't looking at her, giving them no indication what he meant.

The young man in front looked flabbergasted.

"Look at their hands," Said one of the other soldiers. "They're clean!"

"Process them, him first." He said, and for a moment Rose relaxed as the guns were lowered. But in that singular lacked moment, two of the soldiers marched over and took the Doctor by the arms, pulling him toward one of the machines.

"Don't you touch him," She growled, charging toward them before her arms were grabbed and she was being pulled back. One of the soldiers raised a gun and pointed it her, and she laughed without humor. "Not scared of guns, me." She snarled.

"Rose, it's okay." The Doctor tried to calm her while there was apprehension in his voice.

"Oi, do as she says and leave him alone!" Donna yelled out as Martha calmly questioned what was happening.

No one listened, and one of the soldiers took the Doctor's arm and shoved it into a piece of equipment. He yelled out in pain, and for a second Rose broke free. She didn't get far before the muzzle of the gun pointed at her was pressed between her breasts.

"Rose, it's okay, I don't think," And then the Doctor screamed in pain.

"What're you doing to him?" Donna demanded as Rose tried to calm down, seeing that while the Doctor was in pain he didn't seem to be in danger.

"Everyone gets processed," The young soldier, who was clearly in charge of this lot, said in way of explanation.

"It's taken a tissue sample," The Doctor explained, his voice strained. "Ow, ow, ow, ow, and it extrapolated it! Some kind of accelerator?" He explained, and then the machine let him go. He backed up, and Rose pushed the gun muzzle away from her and charged after him. She took his hand, looking at the wound on it. "It'll be fine." He said, his gaze going from her to the bigger portion of the machine.

"You alright?" Martha asked as she and Donna came up to them, the doctor taking the Doctor's hand to examine as the bigger portion of the machine hissed before the doors opened.

A young woman stepped out, looking strangely familiar to Rose in a way that she couldn't put her finger on. The blonde girl, looking barely older than a teenager, glanced around and took in her surroundings.

"Arm yourself," The leader of the small group of soldiers said as he handed her a gun. She took it like it was second nature to hold it, and Rose only just noticed how she was wearing something similar to fatigues.

"Where did she come from?" Martha asked.

"From me," The Doctor said, and Rose whipped her head around and stared at him.

"What do you mean from you?" She asked him, her voice a quiet calm she certainly wasn't feeling.

"I mean, well, umm," he looked down at her, then back to what Rose could only guess was the girl. "Well, she's my daughter."

Daughter?

She was certain she was still breathing, but Rose's head swam like she'd been oxygen deprived. She staggered, looking again to the blonde girl who expertly armed the gun before she looked up at the Doctor with a brilliant smile.

"Hello, Dad." She said cheerfully before turning toward the leader and getting into position for a counter attack, or defense, or something that Rose's mind honestly couldn't decipher regardless of its processing power. Because right now, every cell in her brain was trying to figure out how it was possible for the man she loved to have fathered a daughter with a swatch of skin from the back of his hand.

"I'm sorry, did you say daughter?" Donna asked the exact question Rose's poor brain couldn't properly form but desperately wanted to know.

"Technically," He replied.

"Technically how?" Martha asked, once more vocalizing the thoughts that couldn't escape Rose's lips.

"Progeneration. Reproduction from a single organism. Means one parent is biological mother and father. You take a sample of diploid cells, split them into haploids, then recombine them in a different arrangement and grow. Very quickly, apparently."

Rose swallowed. She stared at the back of the blonde girls head, focusing on her ponytail, trying not to run back to the TARDIS and leave. She'd come to terms with this possibility oh so very long ago, a couple of times if she was really honest with herself. But when he looked at her in the Medbay after first meeting Donna and told her she physically couldn't have children, she accepted that she'd never be a mother with a touch of relief. And, she supposed, as she heard the girl shout about something coming, she still technically wasn't a mother. She could walk away from this, or run as her feet itched to do, and never have to think about it again.

Unless the Doctor wanted her.

And again, Rose's head swam. Was this why the TARDIS brought them here? She decided it was time they added to the family, and seeing as how she was essentially the one who removed Rose's reproductive possibilities, she wanted someway for them to do so. And Rose had kissed his hand,  _that_  hand, the one that went into the machine. The gesture was more common for him to make than her, so could that mean …?

"We've got to blow the tunnel, get the detonator!" The young and in charge man called toward them.

"I'm not detonating anything," The Doctor said.

Everything going around her was blurred and disorienting. She saw something, a fish thing, come up from behind and take Martha. The young, blonde, daughter of the Doctor picked something up while Rose followed two instincts in one go: running from her while trying to protect and save Martha. There was an explosion, and Rose felt everything around her burn hot before it all went black.

* * *

 

"You've sealed off the tunnel! Why did you do that?" The Doctor demanded of his daughter, and if Donna wasn't so worried about Rose and Martha she'd have found it all kinda funny.

"They were trying to kill us," The daughter replied just as a teenager would, but it still wasn't funny enough to actually laugh.

Especially when the Doctor's eyes got that dark look in them. "They took my friend, and my partner could have saved her if you had just held on a moment longer."

"Your friend and partner were collateral damage. At least you've still go her, he lost all his men. I'd say you came out ahead."

The Doctor grinned without joy, teeth bared as he laughed, shaking his head. "No, no, you don't understand. When I say partner, I mean mate. And I'm telling you right now referring to her as collateral damage…."

"Doctor," Donna stopped him, terrified as to what he could do to the girl in front of him as the young thing slowly started to back away. Donna reached into her pocket and handed him her phone. "Call Rose. Super phones, right? So they should work still."

The Doctor took it, turning away abruptly and moving toward the newly formed wall.

As he did, Donna stepped up to the girl who quickly tucked her fear away. "His partner's name is Rose. Their friend's name is Martha. They're people, good people, and you can't just disregard a life like that."

The girl shrugged, about to say something when the little boy who was leading the charge and forced the Doctor to procreate with a machine raised his gun at Donna. A beat later, the Doctor was beside her, tucking her phone into her pocket before putting himself between her and the muzzle.

"You two don't make sense. No guns, no marks, no fight in you." The little boy said. "I'm taking you to General Cobb."

"No problem," The Doctor said. "We'll go willingly, just lower the gun and lead the way."

The little boy, because that's exactly how Donna saw him, considered this for a moment before nodding once. He lowered the gun, turned, and gestured for them all to follow.

The tunnels seemed maze-like, but Donna had noticed a few headings with numbers over certain areas. She thought about mentioning it to the Doctor, but she could tell by the set of his shoulders and the fists at his sides that anything not absolutely crucial to getting Rose and Martha back wasn't going to be heard. Not yet anyway.

Sighing, she noticed the girl coming up beside her, looking wearily at the Doctor and maybe a bit guilty.

"I'm Donna," She introduced herself, trying to relax the girl. "What's your name?"

She shrugged. "Don't know, it's not been assigned yet." She replied.

Assigned. Not given, assigned, like it's a task. "Well if you don't know that, what do you know?" Donna asked, not sure she wanted to know the answer.

"How to fight," The girl replied bluntly.

Yep, she didn't want to know.

"The machine must embed military history and tactics but no name," The Doctor said with unmasked disgust. "She's a generated anomaly."

"Generated Anomaly." Donna repeated, rolling the words around in her head. "Genny-rated." She smiled, looking to the girl. Yep, she was just young and cutesy-looking enough to pull it off. "Well, what about Jenny?"

"Jenny," The girl considered. "Yeah, I like that."

"What do you think, 'Dad'?" Donna asked, partially teasing. But since it was him who said she was his daughter ….

"Good as anything, I suppose." He said with detachment.

"Not what you call a natural parent, are you?" She mused.

"They stole a tissue sample at gunpoint and processed it. It's not what I call natural parentage." He retorted as she came and fell in step with him.

"Rubbish! My friend Nerys fathered twins with a turkey baster, don't bother her." Donna countered. "A child's a child."

"Oh, Nerys? Same woman who you thought paid me to kidnap you on your wedding day? Sounds like an excellent woman to copy parenting skills from. I'm sorry, Donna, but you can't extrapolate a relationship from a biological accident. Just 'cause I share certain physiological traits with simian primates doesn't make me a monkey's uncle, does it?" He countered.

"I'm not a monkey," Jenny protested, pushing past them, stopping to look between them. "Or a child." She added, crossing her arms and narrowing her gaze for a moment before turning abruptly around.

And oh, wasn't that just a bit scary. Because Donna found everything about it very familiar and very un-Doctor like.

Before she could mention it, they reached a giant room that teamed with human life, reminding Donna of an ant hill and completely distracting her from Jenny's mannerisms.

"So where are we? What planet is this?" The Doctor asked, his tone all business as he took in his surroundings.

"Messaline." The little boy leader replied. "Well, what's left of it."

Donna looked around, ignoring the seeming constant announcement of the dead listed by generation. She took in the high ceilings with it's ornate design, noted a platform on the other end that looked distinctly like a stage. The seats stacked against the walls to make space.

"This is a theater." She realized out loud.

"Maybe they're doing  _Miss Saigon_ ," The Doctor said sarcastically before moving over to a much older man, dressed in fatigues like everyone else. Unlike everyone else, though, he carried the weight of authority.

"General Cobb, I presume?" The Doctor said, hands in his pockets as he met the man's eyes.

"Found in the Western tunnels, I'm told, with no marks." The Older man said as she sized the Doctor up. "There was an outbreak of pacifism in the Eastern Zone three generations back, before we lost contact. Is that where you came from?" He asked, glancing briefly to Donna.

"Eastern Zone, yep, that's us. I'm the Doctor, this is Donna." He introduced.

"And I'm Jenny," She said, going up to General Cobb with the smile of a little girl.

He half glared at her. "Don't think you can infect us with your peacemaking." He said to the Doctor. "We're committed to the fight, to the very end."

"Well, that's alright, I can't stay anyway. I have to go find my partner and our friend."

"That's not possible," Cobb dismissed, and Donna knew without seeing the Doctor that that was not the right thing to say. "All movement is regulated. We're at war."

"Yes, I noticed." The Doctor said through his teeth. "With the Hath. But tell me, 'cause we got a bit out of circulation, Eastern Zone and all that, who exactly are the Haths?"

"Back at the dawn of this planet, these ancient halls were carved from the earth. Our ancestors dreamt of a new beginning, a colony where human and Hath could work and live together." Cobb started to explain.

"So what happened?" The Doctor asked.

Cobb shrugged. "The dream died. Broken, along with Hath promises. They wanted it all for themselves. But those early pioneers, they fought back. They used the machines to produce soldiers instead of colonists, and began this battle for survival."

Donna looked around at the windows that showed nothing. "Why build everything underground?" She asked.

"The surface is too dangerous." Cobb replied.

"Then why build windows in the first place? And what does this mean?" She asked the dumbo of a General, pointing up at the plate baring a number very similar to the ones she noted in the tunnel.

"The rites and symbols of out ancestors. The meanings lost in time."

"How long's this war gone on for?" The Doctor asked, sounding a little flabbergasted.

"Longer than anyone can remember. Countless generations marked only by the dead."

"What, fighting all this time?" Donna asked, trying to wrap her head around a war that's spanned so many generations.

"Because we must," Jenny said sincerely. "Every child of the machine is born with this knowledge. It's all we know: how to fight, and how to die."

"Sounds a lot like another war I know of," The Doctor mumbled darkly, glancing about. "Look," He said to Cobb, loud and firm. "I don't care about Haths against humans, but I do care to find the people I've lost. So if you don't mind, you can either tell me the best way to get to them and Donna and I be on our way, or I will figure it out myself which may lead you to having all sorts of other problems. Are we clear?"

Donna grinned, trying very hard to subdue it as the General looked well put in his place.

Cobb nodded, beckoning for them to follow him and leading them over to a table near the middle of the room. He hit a few keys, and a hologram of a two-dimensional map hovered above the table.

The Doctor studied it, slipping on a pair of glasses Donna wasn't entirely sure he needed considering the odd times he decided to pull them out.

"Does this show the entire city, including the Haths zones?" He asked Cobb.

"Yes." Cobb nodded. "I have studied it relentlessly in order to find the Source."

"Ooh, the Source, what's that then? What's a source?" The Doctor asked, his interest perked.

"The breath of life," Cobb said. "In the beginning the great one breathed life into the universe. And then she looked at what she'd done, and she sighed."

"She?" Jenny said with a girlish grin. "I like that."

"It's a creation myth," The Doctor said, shifting just slightly away from Jenny as if he was avoiding seeing her.

"It's not a myth, it's real. That sigh. From the beginning of time it was caught and kept as the Source. It was lost when the war started, but it's here somewhere. Whoever holds the Source controls the destiny of the planet." Cobb finished, looking to the map.

The Doctor leaned in, craning his head and tilting it. "Oh," he said slowly, drawing it out into a couple of syllables. "There's a suppressed layer of information in this map. If I can just…." He took out his sonic thing and pointed it at the hologram. The blue light glowed as a humming whir filled the small bubble of quiet around them. A few seconds later, the map blinked, blurred, then changed. More tunnels appeared on it, with one from each side converging into a room in the middled. "See? A whole complex of tunnels hidden from sight." The Doctor said proudly.

"That must be the lost temple." Cobb said as he pointed to the room in the middle. "The Source will be inside and, look, we are closer than the Haths It's ours." He spun around looking at an eavesdropping soldier nearby. "Tell them to prepare to move out. We'll progenate new solders in the morning, then we march. Once we reach the Temple, peace will be restored at long last."

"Call me old fashioned, but if you really wanted peace couldn't you just stop fighting?" The Doctor pointed out the obvious. Or, at least, the obvious to him and Donna.

"Only when we have the Source. It'll give us the power to erase every stinking Hath from the face of this planet." Cobb said with dark conviction, his back going straighter as his shoulders squared, and her back straightened.

"Hang on," The Doctor said, his own posture making him straighten to his full height which towered over Cobb. "A second ago it was peace in our time, now you're talking about genocide?"

"For us, that means the same thing." Cobb replied without hesitation.

The Doctor laughed mirthlessly. "Then you need to get yourself a better dictionary." He snapped at Cobb, half talking through his teeth while his brown eyes darkened considerably. "When you do, look up genocide. You'll see a little picture of me there and the caption will read 'over my dead body.'"

"And you're the one who showed us the path to victory." Cobb said with a smug grin and a slight shake of the head. "But you can consider the irony from your prison cell. Cline, at arms."

Little boy leader, Cline, was suddenly by Cobb's said with his gun pointed at them.

"Oi, oi, oi, Aright, cool the beans, Rambo." Donna snapped. She was never really a fan of guns, and she was started to like them a lot less.

"Take them, I won't have them spreading treason. And if you try anything, Doctor, I'll make sure your mouthy friend dies first."

"I'm going to stop you, Cobb, you need to know that." The Doctor warned, not seeming phased by the gun.

"I have an army and the breath of god on my side, Doctor. What'll you have?" Cobb challenged.

The Doctor held his stern, fierce gaze, but Donna noted the slight touch of humor in his eyes. "This," The Doctor pointed to his head. "And a wolf."

And for some reason Donna couldn't understand, those four words seemed to shake Cobb terribly.

"Lock them up," he ordered. "And guard them!"

"What about the new soldier?" Cline asked, and Jenny stepped up.

Cobb pushed her back, the Doctor catching the stunned girl by the arms.

"Can't trust her, she's from pacifist stock. Take them all." Cobb said dismissively, turning away from the lot of them before they were lead down to their prison.

* * *

 

When Rose woke up, several fish-humanoid aliens were pointing guns at Martha while she had her hands in the air, sitting beside another fish alien who had its hands up as well. Every single part of her ached, but Rose slowly managed to push herself up. All the guns were trained on her.

"It's alright, she's a friend too." Martha said, glancing between the fish people and her fellow companion.

"Where's the Doctor?" Rose asked, and she noted the slight flinch in Martha's relieved expression but ignored it.

"On the other side of the wall."

"What!" Rose was on her feet, turned to see that there was debris piled high and impenetrable. She reached into her pockets, fumbling a bit until she had her cell out. Before she could get it open, it rang.

"Donna?" She asked.

"Rose," The Doctor's voice replied, his relief palatable. "You're okay."

"Well," She shrugged, "Pretty sure I technically wasn't."

"And Martha?" He asked.

"Fine," She replied. "Don't know how long I was out, though. She seems to have things under control on this side."

"Listen, I'm going to find a way to get to you, I promise." He said.

"Never doubted you would," She smiled his favorite smile even if he couldn't see it.

"And I'll never understand why. Be careful, look out for each other."

"You too," She replied, smile stretching to the point of painful until she heard the girl, the sorta-daughter, arguing in the background with Donna. Then the smile faltered as the call disconnected.

"Rose," Martha got her attention. "We're going somewhere."

Rose nodded, tucking the phone away and was startled as the fish thing offered it's arm like a gentleman. "Oh," She said, looking at the gesture with unmasked surprise before she allowed herself to smile. "Lead the way, then." She said.

There was gurgles, but no translation, so Rose merely nodded when it had and let it lead her with the rest of the fish things and Martha to where they were going, guns safely tucked away.

Along the way, Martha told Rose that the fish people must have been the Haths the humans had mentioned fighting. She didn't ask how Rose managed to miss that point, thankfully, but she was looking to Rose with a bit more than simply concern.

When they arrived at what was very likely the Hath's encampment, she and Martha were greeted with a reverence that apparently included a lot of petting. She allowed it, even giggled a bit when she looked at Martha and saw that she had little idea how to take the situation either.

"Listen," Rose said, clutching the hand of one of the Haths. "I need to find my partner, my mate. He's stuck on the other side. Do you know of a way around? Another route?"

The Hath gurgled, moving it's head like it was considering her request, and then led her by the hand to a table in the middle. It typed a couple things, and then a map flashed up on the screen, one side mirroring the other except for a blinking section.

"Brilliant," Rose smiled.

"I take it we're here?" Martha asked, pointing to the flashing spot. The Haths nodded.

Rose studied the map carefully. "'S a maze, but it looks like maybe we can get there by going this route. Which makes sense because there were two spots over here," She said, pointing to the likely spot they had been when they were attacked, "From which you could enter by."

"Might take a while." Martha noted.

"We've been on longer walks before." Rose noted with an absentminded shrug, glancing to Martha and noting the smirk on her face. It disappeared.

"Wait, hold on," Martha said, and Rose looked back at the map to see it flicker a couple times before new tunnels appeared. There was a center spot, a mutual meeting area, that hadn't been there before. Possibly a neutral zone where they could cross and meet the Doctor and Donna.

She and Martha both broke out into smiles, laughing. "Alright, now that's a shorter walk." Rose noted, looking to the Haths who started gurgling. They were waving their guns in the air in what reminded Rose of whoops of victory. The Haths came and patted she and Martha on the back, gripped their shoulders with excitement. The looked to each other, then watched as the Haths disappeared, leaving them behind in their control room.

"What just happened?" Martha asked.

"No idea." Rose replied, shaking her head and crossing her arms.

"Did we just some how give them a tactical advantage in this war?"

"Looks that way, yeah." Rose huffed. "So much for the possible neutral territory."

"We could still find another way." Martha offered with a shrug.

"Could do," Rose said, looking down at the panel in front of her. Odd words were translated, and she had no idea what she was doing, but it wouldn't be the first time she'd managed to hack a system this way. A couple of flicks, and the map shifted.

"What did you do?" Martha asked.

"No idea," Rose said as the image off the tunnels now appeared as a rotating 3D image.

"Five years, and you still haven't figured out how you've got all this computer knowledge in there." Martha teased, and Rose's lips quirked into a bit of a smile.

"Haven't had to," Rose said, "It's instinct now. 'S just me or does it look like we can get to the surface from here?" She asked Martha, pointing to what looked like an exit to above.

"Yeah," Martha said cautiously, "And it would get us there first, but why are the humans and the Haths underground? Maybe it's unbreathable up there?"

"Could find out," Rose said. She did a couple flicks on the controls, returning the map to its previous form. A script came up that roughly translated to a war strategy that Rose didn't read, trying a few more combinations until surface readings came up.

"Doesn't look too bad," Martha noted. "Nitrogen and oxygen about 80:20, that's fine. Ozone levels are high, and there's some Radiations spikes."

"Martha," Rose said, turning to face her head on. "It doesn't matter to me what the oxygen or the radiation is. It would be painful to endure, may pass out here and there, but it's fine. Question is more would you survive the trip?"

Martha grinned, "Radiations not that bad, as long as we don't spend too long out there."

"Alright," Rose said, beaming now. "Let's go get the Doctor and Donna."

"And his daughter." Martha said cautiously, stopping Rose as she headed for the corridor.

"Right," She said, her enthusiasm dying down a bit. She didn't move until Martha was ahead of her, and she took a second to look down at the ring on her finger. The pink-gold looking band made of an indestructible metal, engraved with her's and the Doctor's names. It was his promise of forever before they knew how long it was, a vow of a stronger, deeper connection in which she would be able to take away some of the silence in his mind. And she knew what accepting it meant, and a lump her throat formed as fear gripped her chest tightly.

"Rose?" Martha called from a few feet down the hall, and Rose pulled herself together enough to catch up to Martha.

* * *

 

"More numbers," Donna noted after they were placed in their cell. "They've gotta mean something," She said, looking to the Doctor who paced around the cell and looking at everything but the little girl in a woman's body huddled in the corner.

"Makes as much sense as the breath of life story." He said.

"You mean that's not true?" Jenny asked, sounding utterly disappointed.

"No, it's a myth," Donna said soothingly. "Isn't it, Doctor?"

He tilted his head side to side. "Yes, but there could still be something real in the temple. Something that's become myth, like a piece of technology or a weapon."

"So the Source could be a weapon and we've just given directions to Captain Nutjob?" She asked.

"Oh yes," He replied, and she could see he was kicking himself mentally.

"Lovely."

"Yeah, but that hidden layer on the map would have been revealed to every map in the tunnel system." He said, turning and looking meaningfully at Donna.

She furrowed her brow, then her eyes lit up. "Rose."

The Doctor nodded. "With any luck she'd have seen it. And while we need to get out of here to stop Cobb from slaughtering the Haths, my clever girl is likely already on her way to do just that." He smirked.

Jenny snorted.

He glanced over. "What?" He asked. "Why are you staring?"

"You keep insisting you're not a soldier, but look at you. Drawing up strategies like a proper general." Jenny nodded from where she sat on the floor, hugging her knees.

"No, I'm trying to stop the fighting." The Doctor countered, and Donna was pretty certain this was the longest he'd looked at her since she emerged from the machine.

"Isn't every soldier?" She asked honestly.

A shudder went through him just then, and Donna noted he  _really_  looked at Jenny then. Eyes wide, a flash of fear and uncertainty there, it took him far too long to blink.

"Well, I suppose that's … that's technically … true." He said, clearing his throat. "But, it's, I mean … you know what? I'm busy!" He shouted and turned abruptly, pulling out his sonic do-hickey and a moving to the end of the cell where his back would be firmly turned to Jenny. A blue light glowed against the wall where a metal bar holding the cell doors in place connected.

"What are you doing?" Donna asked.

"Resonating concrete." He said bitterly.

"With a weapon!" Jenny said. "You've got a weapon."

"It's not a weapon." He said indigently.

"But you're using it to fight back." Jenny said, shaking her head. "You are such a soldier."

The Doctor's back turned to his daughter, Jenny didn't see the flash of hatred, guilt, and self loathing that mixed and mingled on the Doctor's face. And without him ever saying anything on the subject, Donna knew right then that he  _had_  been a soldier once. She could see a bit of that darkness in his eyes along with the sadness, and it broke her heart.

Cheers echoed down the halls, pulling the Doctor from his mind, and his and Jenny's attention was pulled there.

"They're getting ready to move out." He said, abandoning whatever he was doing and getting to his feet, craning his head to see Cline standing guard a few feet away with his back turned. "We have to get past the guard." He said quietly.

"I can deal with him," Jenny said nonchalantly as she got to her feet.

"No, no, no, no, you're not going anywhere." He said firmly, turning to face her.

"What?" Jenny asked, looking equal parts confused and hurt.

"You belong here with them." He said dismissively.

"She belongs with us. With you and Rose. She's your daughter." Donna protested.

"She's a soldier, she came out of a machine." He dismissed.

"Oh yes, I know that bit." Donna said with exasperation, crossing her arms until she was beside them both. "You have that stethoscope on you?" She asked, and he nodded. "Give it to me." She beckoned.

He hesitated, likely knowing what she was going to do, but eventually reached inside his blazer and pulled out the tool.

Donna put it in her ears, trying to steady her own heart beat as she prepared herself to take a leap of faith that she hoped wouldn't make her lean heavily on plan B.

"What're you doing?" Jenny asked, taking a step away as Donna went to have a listen. Her fear was that of a child, and Donna smiled reassuringly.

"It's alright, just hold still." She instructed, putting the stethoscope to Jenny's chest over her left side. A steady beat filled Donna's ears, and her breath hitched as she through she heard it echo. Without meeting either of their intense gazes, Donna shifted the stethoscope to the right, and a second heart beat filled her ears.

She looked to the Doctor, his expression flat but fear and hope shined through.

"Listen." She said softly, handing the tool over to him. "And tell me where she belongs."

He took a deep breath, his hands shaking nearly imperceptible as he repeated Donna's motions. He swallowed hard. "Two hearts." The words barely came out.

"Exactly." Donna said. "So I'm not even going to point out the other reason you need to take her with us."

"What's going on?" Jenny asked nervously.

"You're a …" Donna paused. "What do you call a female Time Lord?" She asked.

"What's a Time Lord?" Jenny asked.

"It's who I am." The Doctor replied.

"And … I came from you, so that means I'm …." Jenny said slowly.

"You're an echo." He said flatly. "That's all. A Time Lord, Lady, is so much more. A sum of knowledge, a code, a shared history, a shared suffering." He swallowed hard. "Only it's gone. It's gone forever."

"What happened?" Jenny asked softly, and Donna could almost physically see the links forming between the two as brown eyes stared into one another.

"There was a war." He said.

"Like this one?" Jenny asked.

The Doctor snorted. "Bigger, much bigger."

"And you fought? And killed?" Jenny asked while seeming to know the answer.

"Yes," He said firmly, and Donna's shoulders sagged at the weight of guessing right and wishing she hadn't.

"Then how are we different?"

"Because I didn't have a choice." The Doctor said with a sigh.

"And neither do I." Jenny pointed out. "I was created for war, fighting is all I know. But maybe you can teach me another way." Her words made the Doctor's jaw drop. "But first, let me help get us out of here."

Jenny straightened her shirt, fixed her pony tail, and moved to the cell doors where she draped her self around them.

"Oh, has she left you speechless?" Donna teased. The Doctor didn't reply, merely snapping his jaw shut as he stared after Jenny while she called Cline over. "Maybe having her around will be good. For you, and Rose."

He didn't react, he just stared as Jenny flirted heavily with Cline before pulling him in for a kiss and taking his gun.

"Donna," he said slowly. "You said there was another reason we should take her with us."

"Yeah?" She replied.

"Well," He said, swallowing as Cline unlocked the doors and held them open as Jenny kept the gun pointed at him. "I think I see it, too. But … it's impossible."

Donna didn't say anything to that. What could she? She didn't know what they did in the privacy of … and, well, she knew that when Martha was talking to her Mum and Granddad that Rose and the Doctor would have been alone. Not like there would have been much time to properly clean up.

She didn't think too much on it, didn't want to. She followed the Doctor and Jenny out the door, pausing with them as they locked Cline inside, and then continued with them as they made their great escape.


	14. The Doctor's Daughter pt 2

"So engaged after less than a year," Rose said in way of conversation as she and Martha traversed the bleak surface that reminded both of them a touch too much of being at the end of the Universe. They'd already discussed Rose being tied to the Doctor, a conversation that immediately came about once they were above, and one Rose honestly didn't mind having. It was the intensity of that which lead to Martha mocking her own seemingly insignificant engagement.

Martha fiddled with her ring as she walked. "He asked me just before he left for Africa, at his going away party."

"So you couldn't say no if you wanted to." Rose said with a nod, glancing over to see Martha blushing. "Oh my god, I was joking."

"No, it's alright, it's just … that's what my Mum said. Don't get me wrong, she likes Tom, but …."

"A year is a bit soon." Rose nodded.

Martha nodded too. "I love him, Rose, I do. But you know? I loved the Doctor, too. I mean, I look at him now, and I'm fond of him, and I'm so happy the two of you are happy, but I don't feel that way about him anymore. And that terrifies me because before I found out about the two of you I was willing to spend forever with him. Now I step back, look at where Tom and I are, and I worry. Because now I'm willing to give him the rest of my life, and sometimes I wonder …."

"If it'll last." Rose nodded.

Martha nodded too. They were silent for a few steps, Rose catching Martha glancing over at her in her peripheral vision. "How did you know? With the Doctor? How did you know he was different?"

"Didn't at first." Rose replied honestly. "I just ran to him because I liked how he made me feel, and I wanted more of that. He was … he was different in a way that I assumed was 'cause he's alien. And I thought I just fancied him a little bit. And then I'd seen a bit of his darker side, and I thought maybe I was dealing with another Jimmy. That was my ex before Mick's, Jimmy. I was a blind girl in love with him, ruined my own life to try and make him happy and all I got for my trouble was a black eye and a bunch of debt."

"Does the Doctor know?" Martha asked, her eyes wide and her mouth gaping a bit.

Rose chuckled. "Yeah, he, umm, threatened Jimmy after the black eye. Time travel," She added when Martha's brow furrowed. "And I guess Jack did too, but anyway. I figured out that the Doctor was different when …" She paused, swallowing back the lump. "When he took me to see my Dad just before he died."

Martha's hand clamped around Rose's. "That was sweet of him."

"It was stupid." Rose laughed. "I caused so much damage, actually caused the Doctor to die for a moment, and … and he forgave me." She said, remembering that not only did he forgive her, but he held her in the library all through the night, murmuring reassurances and stroking her hair until she'd fall asleep for a short while. His double heartbeat reminding her that he was still there.

She looked to Martha, holding her eye. "It's not fair to Tom to compare him and you to the Doctor and I, it's too different. And really, a man's ego is so delicate, knowing that the bloke you were previously around could give you the stars …." She stopped when Martha's face darkened with blush. "He doesn't know." Rose said, understanding.

"I don't know how to tell him," Martha shook her head. "When he asked why my family are so … they're all still suffering from a bit of PTSD, and all I can tell him is they witnessed something horrific, all of us but my brother, and we just can't talk about it. I don't dare tell him about my travels, or anything, because it's so hard for me to explain them. But he's missing such a big part of who I am." She snorted. "He thinks I've joined UNIT to pay off my student debts."

"But your family's rich." Rose laughed incredulously.

"Yet he's so sweet he never points that out." Martha snorted, shaking her head.

"He sounds it." Rose said, and they continued in comfortable silence.

"Rose, I gotta ask," Martha said, stopping and making Rose do the same. "He has a daughter."

Rose took a deep breath. "Not a question, that."

"Not exactly, no." Martha reasoned. "But he does. She's his, genetically."

"Yeah," Rose nodded. "Still not a question though, is it?"

Martha grinned weakly. "You can't have children," She reminded Rose. "This is as close as the two of you can get to a family. Would you … I mean, you haven't really acknowledged it."

Rose looked at her feet. "I know." She said.

"So if he wanted to bring her on board?"

"I'd do it in heartbeat." Rose said instantly. "I'd do anything to make him happy, 'specially considering how much trouble I've been over the years. 'S just …."

And Martha nodded, and maybe it's because she remembered their various discussions on the topic, or maybe she understood that Rose really didn't want to discuss it with her. No grudge against Martha, she just simply didn't know the woman well enough. Martha didn't know how much this creation changed things, if the Doctor wanted it that way. How things would shift for Rose once again.

* * *

_Six years ago ...._

"I was a Dad once."

The off-handed sentence hit her like a sack of bricks, and she couldn't hide the surprise those five words caused if she tried. The man she loved just informed her that he'd had kids, and she had just spent the last few minutes of their time together reaffirming to herself why she would never be a mother. Not so long as she had the magnificent Time Lord in her life. And it didn't matter to her if things that happened never got talked about, like a night of intense intimacy under a black hole while sharing a bed but not so much as a kiss passing between them, or words left unsaid when facing monsters who threatened to tear them apart. She would travel with him forever because simply being with him was enough. And besides, not like she ever really wanted kids anyway.

But maybe ….

He'd refereed to family life as the 'one adventure he could never have'. And as they walked back to the TARDIS after saving the world and munching cupcakes with edible ball bearings, it occurred to Rose that maybe the reasoning behind his thoughts of that particular adventure was because he'd have no one to share it with.

"We should probably rest instead of skipping ahead." He said as she opened the door, leading her inside. "Especially you, been a long day."

She nodded, and he tugged her hand with a smile as he led her down the corridor.

"Did you want the library or your bedroom?" He asked, the TARDIS conveniently putting the two doors opposite of each other.

"Umm," Rose said, bitting her lip as she decided. "Library," She said, taking a deep breath. "I want to talk for a bit."

"Okay, yeah, sure," The Doctor nodded, a nervous smile playing on his gorgeous face as he made a right and entered the library.

They took their normal talking positions, the Doctor tucked into the corner of the sofa while Rose laid down with her head on his lap. It hadn't been that way when he wore leather, but then again they didn't talk quite as in depth as they had now, especially as of late.

Curled up with his fingers lightly playing with her hair, Rose dredged up every bit of courage she had. "What were your children like?"

He was silent for a very long time, and she thought maybe he wouldn't answer, and she was okay with that.

"Never had the best relationship with them," He said quietly, his fingers moving closer to her scalp. "Their mother didn't tolerate my wanderlust, my … my rebellious nature so she tended to keep our children away from me when she could. My daughter, my only daughter, she was a bit like me until she entered the academy. They sucked all that free thinking out of her, every last bit. Made her just like their mother."

"You keep saying 'their mother.'" Rose noted, her hand reaching for his free one, locking their hands together.

"Because referring to her as my wife never sat well with me. I didn't love her. Time Lords, we had arranged marriages. It was all about politics and genetics, never about love. Getting married was almost like signing a peace treaty, it was so diplomatic. Then for show we did the binding ritual though we didn't bond, she and I…." He paused, and Rose barely dared to breath. "But we were talking about my children. We sorta fell out as they grew up, all but my daughter. And then she had a daughter. I told you about Susan, my first companion?" Rose nodded as he looked down at her for confirmation. "She was my granddaughter. I loved her so much."

"She left to get married, yeah?" Rose confirmed.

The Doctor nodded. "To a human," He smiled dreamily. "Didn't understand it then, or for centuries really. She gave up being a Time Lord, a full fledged one, to be with a human." He fell quiet, and she turned her head to rest her forehead against his wrist. "I bet you'd make a great mother one day." He said with something like heartache in his voice.

Rose scoffed. "How can you possibly say something like that when you heard how I went on about children earlier?"

"I did say someday, Rose Tyler. You're still young yet, even by human standards. You might change your mind."

"I don't think small children would do well on the TARDIS." She said without thinking.

"You aren't going to want to stay with me forever." He said, not at all dismissive but maybe a little heart broken.

Rose turned her head and met his brown eyes. "Yes I am." She said firmly. "When I said that on that planet I was serious."

The smile ghosted his lips before it became full again. And for a moment, just a fleeting moment, Rose could picture tiny blonde children with big brown eyes running about the TARDIS. Because it didn't matter to her what forever held, so long as it was with him. And maybe if she was lucky, really and truly, then he loved her like she loved him. And if he wanted twenty kids she would have them for him regardless what it did to her body or her sanity. She would do anything for the Doctor.

* * *

_Present_

She had changed and grown so much since then. She remembered what a relief it was to know that children weren't going to happen not two months after that conversation. That she was still going to promise him forever and everything she could give but children were firmly off the table and he knew that. It never bothered her, not once, and she was fairly certain that as heartbreaking as it was he knew he'd be the last of his species. It was just going to be the two of them until the end of time, but now ….

A daughter. She had no idea if that's how he truly viewed the girl who emerged from the machine, and considering it was his daughter and granddaughter he was the closest to among his Gallifreyan family it wouldn't have surprised her in the least if he connected with this latest female in his life.

"I get it," Martha said, sounding truly empathetic. "I imagine it's like being with a bloke for years and then finding out he had children with an ex that you never knew about. Still, considering the circumstances."

"Yeah," Rose conceded. She wanted to call him, to find out how he was getting along with this sorta-child of his. But she refrained. She didn't want to know, not really, not until she could see for herself what he was like with her and what she should expect.

"Look," Martha said. "I think that' the entrance, over there."

"Good," Rose said, breathing an honest sigh of relief.

The faster she was with the Doctor again, the better.

* * *

 

Donna was still a little miffed that the Doctor essentially said she was unattractive. While she had no desire to be seen that way by the skinny alien, she couldn't help but be offended that he thought a wind-up mouse from inside his pockets (what else did he have in those bloody pockets?) was better than her trying to flirt with the age appropriate guard. She could get a bloke to turn his head, thank you very much. It wasn't a skill meant only for blondes. And it was a better alternative to the solution Jenny came up with.

Poor Jenny. All she wanted, Donna could see, was her father's approval. She wanted to live up to what she thought he wanted from her based solely on the knowledge she was created with. She knew that look, felt what Jenny was likely feeling all too well. The little girl in a grown woman's body reminded Donna a little bit too much of herself in that aspect.

And even now, looking at the way Jenny chewed her lip and looked up at the Doctor as he studied the map the guard she knocked out had on him, she wanted him to be proud. Even if her instinct had been to use the gun. Even if she still ended up using it, just in a different way, she wanted her Dad to look at her and say 'good job'.

Which made Donna start to wonder how Rose would have handled the situation. She wasn't so innocent herself, after all, and Donna knew that there was nothing she wouldn't do to make the Doctor happy. So how hard would she have pushed to get the Doctor to warm up to his daughter?

"This is it," The man himself said, pulling Donna from her thoughts as he turned about, looking between a wall and the map. "The hidden tunnel, it's here. Must be a control panel." He said as he pulled out his sonic and rushed over. Donna looked up to see how he could tell, but instead of finding any hint of what that was, she saw another set of numbers.

"It's another one of those numbers." She noted, pointing up.

"The original builders must've left them." The Doctor said as soniced the panel.

"You got a pen? Bit of paper?" She asked him, almost daring to reach into his pockets to look for them herself but scared to find out what was in there or how deep they went. He reached in, tucking away the map and bringing out a pen and a notepad. Donna took them, immediately jotting down the numbers. "This one ends in 1-4, the prison cell said 1-6." She noted out loud, also recording the number she thought she remembered from theater.

"Always thinking, both of you." Jenny said. "Who are you people?"

"I told you, I'm the Doctor. He said eyes focused on the task at hand.

"That's it?" Jenny asked, eyebrow quirking just like the Doctor's did.

"That's all he ever says." Donna said.

"So you don't have a name either?" Jenny said eagerly, trying to look around and up at him while the Doctor firmly kept his back to her. "Are you an anomaly, too?"

"No." He said firmly.

"Oh, come off it! You're the most anomalous bloke I've ever met." Donna said as there was a pop like a latch releasing.

"Here it is," The Doctor said as he removed a plate of metal to reveal the controls underneath.

Jenny moved around, leaning on the wall beside him. "And Time Lords, what are they for exactly?"

The Doctor paused in his task and looked up at Jenny. "'For?' They're not 'for' anything."

"So what do you do?" Jenny asked as the Doctor returned to his work.

"I travel, through space and time, with Rose." He paused in his sonic. "And that one." He said with a nod in Donna's direction, turning to flash her a teasing smile before he returned to sonicing.

"Oi, watch it, Spaceman." She growled with good humor. She turned to Jenny. "They save planets, rescue civilizations, defeat terrible creatures. And run, a lot. Seriously, there's an outrageous amount of running."

"What's she like?" Jenny asked. "Rose? What's she like?"

The Doctor stopped again, his posture relaxing a bit as he turned to Jenny, looking her over as if seeing her as someone else. "She's the most amazing woman I have ever known. She's saved me in more ways than one, so many times over that I could never repay her. She's got one of the biggest hearts I've ever seen, more empathetic than anyone else I had ever traveled with. She's magnificent."

Damn. Donna swallowed back the tears that threatened to spill. There was so much love and reverence in his voice that she was actually a bit jealous. Not of Rose, not for having that skinny twig, but that no one had ever said anything remotely close to that to her.

"She sounds amazing." Jenny said.

"She is." He agreed, returning to the control panel. It was seconds later that the door opened. "Haha! Got it!" He cheered as he straightened up and pocketed his Sonic. Voices came from down the hall, sounding a bit too much like Cobb and his goons. "Now, what were you saying about running?" He said to Donna, gesturing to the newly opened corridor before taking off.

Jenny was right on her father's tail, nearly keeping pace with him despite her legs being shorter than the Doctor's, and the fact she was still carrying the gun. Donna followed behind, quick though still relatively out of shape by comparison, and when they came to a stop she was momentarily grateful to be able to catch her breath.

Of course, she wasn't counting on the reason they stopped being a laser grid that looked like something out of a spy film.

"That's not mood lighting, is it?" Donna said. She watched the Doctor pull the wind-up mouse from his pocket again, wind it up, and let it go. The second it touched a beam it sparked and smoked before falling apart. "No, didn't think so." She said, still trying to be funny even though even she couldn't bring herself to find her sarcasm chuckle worthy.

"Arming Device." The Doctor grumbled as he moved to another control panel.

She shook her head, putting her hands on her hips and looked around, doing a double take as her eyes fell on another set of numbers. "There's more." She said, though was pretty sure no one was actually paying attention. "Always eight numbers, counting down the closer we get." She jotted them down, looking at the numbers and pondering their meaning.

"Almost have this, I think." The Doctor said as his sonic whirred and hummed.

Voices started to come from down the hall.

"Better be quick." Donna said.

Jenny turned to leave, but the Doctor reached out and grabbed her arm. "Where are you going?" He asked her.

"I can hold them up." Jenny said as if it were obvious.

"No," The Doctor said firmly, and Donna could almost hear a 'not dressed like that' kind of tone in his voice. It would seem that even as he tried to deny it, he was a father in his core.

"But it's us or them," Jenny protested, using the only logic she'd been given to follow and arming the weapon in her hands.

"It doesn't mean you have to kill them." The Doctor said sternly, holding her eye. "After a while it infects you, the killing. And once it does you're never gonna get rid of it. I know this from experience, so does Rose."

"But I don't have a choice." Jenny replied looking him square in the eye.

He shook his head. "No, Jenny, you do.  _You_  do. I didn't, but that was a very different circumstance."

She seemed to consider this, then shook her head. "I'm sorry." She said, and the Doctor called after her as she ran around the corner to try and hold them off.

The Doctor returned to sonicing the panel, and when the gun fire ran out Donna could see the faint trace of worry in his features even as he tried to wear a mask. "I told you, nothing but a soldier."

"She's trying to help," Donna snapped. "If that were Rose, would you say the same?"

His head whipped up and he stared at her, holding his sonic in place as he gapped at her. Donna could almost see the thoughts going through his head, but didn't have a chance to ask about it before the beams flickered off.

"Jenny, come on!" He called out, and a tiny thrill went through Donna as the name fell from his lips.

"I'm coming," she called back.

Donna and the Doctor ran through the corridor, him clutching her hand to make sure she was beside him, both of them stopping and turning to watch for Jenny. Seconds tick by, and the Doctor started to fidget.

"Jenny, come on!" He called out.

Just as she reentered the corridor, a big giddy grin on her face, the beams came back on.

"No!" The Doctor said, reaching up and pulling on his hair. "No, no, no, the circuits looped back."

"Zap it back." Donna partially yelled.

"The controls are back there," He snapped in panic.

"They're coming," Jenny called over to them.

"Wait, just … there isn't," The Doctor stuttered, his mouth moving without words. "Jenny I can't!" His voice cracked.

"I'll just have to manage on my own." She called out, setting her gun a side and taking a couple steps back. "Watch and learn, father!" She yelled and then …

Somersaults. The petite little blonde started somersaulting through the spy movie grid of lasers with spy movie moves that seemed unfathomable.

"No way," Donna said, her voice drenched in disbelief. "That's impossible." She said, turning to the Doctor and finding another thing she could barely believe.

He looked on in awe, with pride and absolute joy as a smile slowly started to form. "No, not impossible." He said, shaking his head slowly. "I know at least one other person who could do that."

"Who?" Donna asked.

He turned to her, his grin wide and manic. "Rose."

Because this whole thing couldn't get any weirder, of course.

As Jenny finished her last maneuver, the Doctor pulled her into an embrace. "Brilliant, absolutely brilliant you were." He said proudly.

"I didn't kill him!" Jenny said as if she was telling him she made a sports team at school. "General Cobb, I could have killed him, but I didn't. You were right, I had a choice."

"That's my girl," The Doctor said, though the moment of Father/Daughter bonding was cut short as the soldiers rounded the corner. "Go," He said to Jenny and looked to Donna. He nodded, she nodded back, and she ushered Jenny around the corner. A few seconds later, after a conversation between the Doctor and who Donna would guess was the general, the Doctor came up and met them just as gun shots ran out. They didn't need to be told, and they continued on.

After it seemed the danger had passed, they eased up. The Doctor had the map back out, checking the route as he led them on and Jenny fell back in step with Donna.

"So Rose is Dad's wife?" Jenny asked.

"Not yet," Donna said, hearing a slight grumble from the Doctor that sounded like 'don't start'.

"And so you …?" Jenny said, looking up at Donna. "What are you, Dad's sister?"

She grinned. "No, just a friend. I travel him your Dad and your … and Rose." She said, carefully catching herself before she said the 'M' word.

A pause. "What's it like? The traveling?" Jenny asked, looking up at Donna with the eyes of a child.

"Ah, never a dull moment. Can be terrifying, brilliant, and funny. Sometimes all at the same time. I've seen some amazing things, though. Whole new worlds," Donna replied.

"I'd love to see new worlds." Jenny said wistfully, a dreamy look that reminded Donna instantly of the Doctor's when he discovered something new.

She glanced up, seeing the Doctor had been half listening to the conversation with a sly grin. "You will, won't she Doctor?"

"I'm sure she will," He said slyly, stopping and smiling down at Jenny warmly.

"You mean," Jenny stammered. "You mean you'll take me with you?"

"Can't leave you here, can we?" He said like it had always been the plan.

Jenny jumped up, wrapping her arms around his neck and causing him to stumble before he could hug her back. "Thank you!" She said, repeating over and over as she squeezed him tightly. "Come on! Let's go! Sooner this is over the sooner we go!" She said, leaping away from him and darting ahead.

"Careful," He called after her. "There might be traps." He said, putting his hands in his pockets and looking proud.

"Kids, they never listen." Donna teased, rolling her eyes and shaking her head before noticing the Doctor's smile fell, and something else crossed his face. "Oh, I know that look." She said. "See it a lot 'round our way. Blokes with pushchairs and frowns. You've got dad-shock." She said, nudging his shoulder with her own.

"Dad-shock?"

"Sudden, unexpected fatherhood. Take a bit of getting used to." She explained.

He shook his head. "Not that." He said. "I made a promise to Rose a long time ago that all new companions would be agreed on. That I wouldn't make a spontaneous decision without her."

"But that's your daughter." Donna said as if he was being stupid.

"Yes," He said, looking down at her. "She's  _my_  daughter. I have a child, and Rose … oh I see so much of her in Jenny. So much Tyler in general. I don't know how. I have an idea, but," he sighed. "She can't have children herself. Not even sure she really wanted to be a mother. We … sorta discussed it once. And it was fine, we were fine with it all because honestly, I've been a father before and I've lost all that a long time ago."

"I'm sorry," Donna said, her argument for his Rose reason falling from her lips and mind the second he said his confession.

"When I look at Jenny, I remember the hole they left and the pain that filled it."

"Tell me this, Doctor." Donna said as they spotted Jenny waiting for them. "If Rose could have had children, and she wanted them with you, would you deny her that joy because of your pain?"

He looked at her meaningfully. "I'd never deny Rose anything if it was in my means to give it to her." He replied as she suspected he would.

"Then why are you denying yourself?" Donna challenged. "Because I'm sure she'd do the same thing for you. And when we find her and she sees how you look at that little girl she could never, ever tell you no. And if she tried, then she's not who you thought she was."

Before the Doctor could say anything to that, shouts echoed from behind them.

"Sounds like they've blasted through," Jenny said, jumping a bit and coming up to them. "Time to run again. Love the running, yeah?"

The Doctor beamed, and Donna couldn't help but beam as well. "Love the running," He said to Jenny, reaching down and taking her hand,

If it hadn't been for armed soldiers catching up to the, Donna may have teared up a little at the gesture.

* * *

 

"Oh that was close," Jenny said as she put her back against the now closed door, sealing them inside what everyone was calling a temple but looked more like a space ship to Donna. Well, a proper space ship, anyhow.

"No fun otherwise." The Doctor said, smiling manically at his daughter who, while clearly having the time of her life, didn't look quite so wild as her dear ol' Dad. The three ran to the end of the corridor, leaning on a rail and looking up at the giant metal walls with pipes showing.

"It's not what I'd call a temple," Donna voiced the opinion while she thought she could get a word in.

"It looks more like a …." Jenny started to say.

"Fusion-drive transport! It's a space ship." The Doctor interrupted enthusiastically.

"What, the original one?" Donna asked, looking around at the ship which still seemed completely functional.

"Well, it could be," The Doctor said as he also looked around. "But the power cells would have run down after all that time. This one's still powered-up. Come on." He said, breaking into a light jog as they moved up a couple flights of stairs. As they get up to the next level sparks catch their eye. One of the doors is being cut open, though Donna has to wonder why they wouldn't have simply gone for the hinges.

"It's the Haths." Jenny said, looking between the door and her Dad. "That doors not going to last much longer, and if General Cobb gets through down there, war's gonna break out."

He nodded, turning about until a light came to his eyes. "Look, look, look," The Doctor said eagerly as he ran to what looked like an over-size, keyboardless laptop. "Ship's log. First wave of Human/Hath co-colonisation of planet Messaline."

"So it is the original ship." Jenny said with wonder.

"What happened?" Donna asked, looking at the log, reading over the Doctor's shoulders.

"Phase one, construction. Used robot drones to build the city." He scrolled down further, faster than Donna could process anything.

"Does it mention the war?" She asked, looking up and catching the sight of the numbers over the entry point they came through. She moved slowly toward it, jotting down the number from habit as she listened to the Doctor ramble.

"Final entry. Mission commander dead. Still no agreement on who should assume leadership. Hath and humans have divided into fractions. That must be it, a power vacuum. The crew divided, turning on each other and used the progenation machines to create armies. Fighting a never ending war."

"Armies that are now both outside," Jenny said, but that didn't worry Donna.

Because she glanced at a screen, seeing another set of numbers, and it all clicked.

"Doctor, look." She said, pointing to the numbers above the entryway.

The Doctor looked at her then followed her gaze. "It's like the numbers in the tunnels." He noticed.

"Yeah, but no, listen. I spent six months working as a temp in Hounslow Library, and I mastered the Dewey Decimal System in two days flat. I'm good with numbers, and it's staring us in the face." She said excitedly, turning to the one point five Time Lords and seeing their blank expressions staring back. "It's the date!" She nearly screamed with enthusiasm. "Assuming the first two numbers are some big old space date, then you've got year, month, day. It's the other way 'round, like in America." She explained, her pride soaring as she watched the Doctor step forward and squint before smacking himself on the head.

"Oh! It's the New Byzantine Calendar." He said as if she should know what that was. And while she didn't, it still made her feel more clever in that moment.

"The codes are completion dates for each section. They finish it, the stamp the date on. So the numbers aren't counting down, they're going out, from here, day by day."

"Oh, good work, Donna." He said proudly.

She shook her head, "Yeah, but you're still not getting it." She said with a touch of smugness. "The first number I saw back there was 6012-07-17. Look at the date," She said, pointing at the screen.

"07-24 … no!" The Doctor said, finally getting it.

"What does it mean?" Jenny asked.

"Seven days." The Doctor replied in shock.

"What do you mean, seven days?" She asked again.

"Seven days since war broke out." He said, and Jenny just blinked at him.

"The war started just a week ago," Donna explained. "A week!"

Jenny shook her head, confusion wrinkling her brow. "They said years."

"No, they said generations," Donna corrected kindly. "And if they're all like you, and they're products of the machines."

"The could have 20 generations in a day." The Doctor said, pulling on his hair. "Each generation gets killed in the war, passes on the legend. Oh, Donna, you're a genius." He said, and grabbing her shoulders and smiling broadly.

And she felt on top of the world, outsmarting mister smarty-pants and the girl who would likely end up being smarty-pants junior.

"But all the buildings, the encampments, they're in ruins." Jenny tried to reason, almost sounding panicked over the idea.

"No they're not ruined," The Doctor shook his head. "They're just empty, waiting to be populated. They've mythologized their entire history." He said, realization washing away his grin. "Which means the Source my be part of that too, come on." He said, heading up another set of stairs and turning the corner.

As soon as they did, everyone stopped short as two very familiar and welcomed faces appeared.

"Rose!" He exclaimed, and she didn't say anything as he picked her up and held her tight, though the smile Rose wore was enough for anyone to see how happy she'd been to be reunited with the Doctor.

Martha came over and hugged Donna, and the moment was fully of joy and happiness until one single word from Jenny's mouth made everyone tense.

"Mum!"

* * *

 

Mum.

That single word uttered from the girl's mouth let Rose know absolutely everything she needed to about what happened while they had been separated.

And she panicked. Glancing up at the Doctor who still had his hands on her waist, he looked about as surprised as she did at the word that rang out with utter joy.

He looked between the girl and Rose with wide eyes and a slacked jaw. "Umm," He finally said. "Jenny, umm…."

"Jenny," Rose repeated the name, finally letting herself really look at the girl it belonged to. And it killed her a little to see the Doctor's brown eyes staring back at her with disappointment.

"Oh," Jenny said. "Right. I only have one parent, 'cause of the machine. So, he's my Dad, but that doesn't mean…."

"Now, now, now hold on, here, just a tick." The Doctor said, pulling a hand off Rose's waist to signal for Jenny to do just as he asked. He then turned to Rose, and she met his pleading eyes, her heart breaking at how scared he seemed to be of what either she or he was going to say. "Rose, I know. Okay, I know, I get it. I'm still wrapping my head around it, too. But she has two hearts," He said, and Rose's breath caught in her throat. She glanced at Jenny again, seeing the fear that made her avert her eyes immediately. "But I think, I think there's more going on here than a simple anomaly like I thought. Because if you look at her, and I mean really look at her you can see … well, just," He stopped, moving to stand behind her and positioning Rose so she had to look at Jenny. "Doesn't she have the same shaped face as someone you lost? Her grandmother, perhaps?" He suggested. Rose could see it, especially in the chin and the nose, and it made her heart hammer in her chest. "She's flirty, and spunky, and I bet she can slap like no one's business. She seems to have a very strong gymnastic skill set."

"But it's not possible." Rose said quiet enough that only he could hear it.

"I'm not so sure." He said. "You kissed my hand, Rose. The hand that they stuck in the machine. Saliva, even trace amounts, carries DNA. I'm not certain, but I think a little bit of you ended up in there, too."

She stared down Jenny, trying to wrap her mind around the possibilities, but she couldn't. She just couldn't. Shaking her head, she wanted to voice it, tell the Doctor it just really wasn't likely, but voices from below stopped her.

"That's the general, we haven't got time for this right now." He said, letting go of Rose's shoulder.

"We don't even know what we're looking for. Nothing in their legends said with the Source looked like." Donna said, and Rose glanced at Martha who merely shrugged.

"I don't know about the rest of you, but I smell flowers," She said, and Rose nodded despite not really having smelled anything at all aside from the Doctor since they found them.

"Yes," He said, "Bougainvillea. I say we follow our noses!" He took her hand, guiding her to follow to which Rose was thankful for as her mind started deciphering the possibilities of the girl running on the other side of him.

Two hearts, and her mother's chin. But then again, the Doctor regenerates, and while Rose vaguely recalled a regeneration with blonde hair in the TARDIS archive, she didn't remember any of them quite looking like Jenny did. He was the closest, and that seemed logical given it was this body that fathered her. She did kiss his hand, but she didn't exactly feel like that should have been enough for her to mother ….

Nope, she wasn't going there. There was no connection, no bond, nothing that she was sure she should be feeling toward the girl.

Yet ….

Her thoughts were blissfully interrupted when they entered a room that reminded Rose of a tropical green house. It was filled with plants that looked similar to palm trees and ferns, flowers that looked like ones she'd seen in Hawaii on Earth. Old Earth, not new.

"Oh yes," The Doctor said as he took it all in. "Isn't this brilliant?" He asked no one in particular before dropping Rose's hand and heading over to a beautiful sphere sitting on a pedestal in the middle of the room.

"Is that the Source?" Donna asked, and the Doctor nodded.

"It's beautiful," Jenny said as she moved to step up by the Doctor.

Rose approached slowly, looking at the way the sphere shimmered. "I've seen this before, haven't I?" She asked.

"Oh yes," The Doctor repeated, his grin wide and excited. "When we helped Terraform Colopias 9 a few years back. Third generation terraforming, this one is. Not quiet as high tech, but still very good at its job."

The cocking of guns put a halt to the moment of wonder, and the Haths and humans surrounded them instantly.

Having known the Haths to be friendly to she and Martha, Rose immediately shifted to stand between the humans wielding guns and the Doctor.

"Stop, hold your fire." He called out from behind her, but Rose focused on the men in front of her. One in particular, older and war worn, looked a bit too vicious for her liking. He was dressed similar to Jenny but he clearly didn't see her as an ally as it seemed his gun was leaning more toward her than the Doctor.

"What is that?" He asked, gesturing with his weapon.

"A way to end the war. You said you wanted it over." The Doctor said.

"I want this war won." The man replied firmly.

"You can't win." The Doctor said, his voice coming closer, and Rose risked turning to see what he was doing. "No one can, you don't even know why you're here. Your history is just Chinese whispers." He said, pointing at the Sphere that was now behind him. "That's the Source. That's what you're fighting over. A device to rejuvenate a planet's ecosystem. It's nothing mystical, it's from a laboratory. It's used to make planets habitable." He backed up toward it. "Look around you. It's not for killing, it's for bringing life. If you allow it, it can lift you out of these dark tunnels and into the bright, bright sunlight. No more fighting, no more killing." He looked to Jenny, gesturing to the sphere. "You wanted to see new worlds, Jenny, let's start right now. Pick that up." He said, and she did as she was told. "I'm the Doctor, he said. "And I declare this war over. Jenny, drop it."

Biting her lip in an eerily familiar gesture, Jenny lifted the sphere over her head and threw it to the ground.

Her eyes went wide as the sphere shattered, all the gases Rose knew were inside escaped in tendrils of gold and green, dancing in the air around them. She heard the guns being set down, and she looked to the Haths first, giving one that met her eye briefly a smile. She then turned to the humans, seeing they had all done the same.

Except the one who spoke. He looked on coldly, bitterly, and that intensity was directed at the Doctor. Or maybe, Rose realized, it was at both he and Jenny.

Jenny, who smiled like the Doctor and had a laugh that sounded like music. She looked at the gasses in the air around her with child like wonder because that's exactly what she was in her core, a child.

Rose saw the vicious looking man lifting his gun, and she acted out of instinct. Not just one to save the Doctor, but one to save his child.

The gun fired, and the pain hit Rose just left of her heart.

"Mum!" She heard Jenny cry out as her head swam and her knees started giving out. She watched through blurred vision as the humans took hold of the man who shot her, subduing him and removing any weapons from his vicinity. When it occurred to her she hadn't hit the ground she realized that there were arms around her and clutching her.

"It's okay," The Doctor's voice said softly. "I've got you, I've got you, it's alright." He lowered her to the ground, resting her head in his lap. He stroked her hair, keeping one hand on her waist, so she had to turn and see the owner of the cool hands clutching her arm.

Tears were streaming down Jenny's face, and Rose instinctively reached up to wipe one away. "'S okay." She said, her breathing slowing and making her words no more than a whisper.

"But you can't. You can't, I just met you. Please, Mum. Please."

Rose smiled, before her vision began spotting. She closed her eyes allowing the last breath to leave her body without any struggle.

She woke up exactly where she died, her eyes falling on Jenny first. "Hello," She said, shifting her gaze to the Doctor. "Hello." She repeated for him.

"Hello," He smiled, shaking his head. "Never get used to that." He said. "I don't care how bullet proof you've become every time you die I'm scared you won't come back."

"I know," She said as she struggled to sit up, wincing through the pain. She noticed they were alone now, Haths and humans having vacated the room while she was out. "Where is everyone?"

"Off to negotiate a peace treaty." The Doctor replied. "When they saw you die, essentially, they took Cobb away and decided that his way was just wrong. That they'd all been wrong. Donna gave them a brief summary of their actual history, and well, they agreed to start over."

"Blimey, how long was I out?" Rose asked as she stood up, looking at the weary faces of Donna and Martha, then back to the Time Lord. "How long, Doctor?"

He looked at his feet. "Four minutes, thirty nine seconds from the moment your heart actually stopped. I think you must have blacked out a bit before that."

Rose nodded, then looked to Jenny. "You alright?" She asked, and the girl nodded.

"We should get Martha home." The Doctor said. "Now that everything is settled here, we can move on." He took Rose's hand and then looked at Jenny. "Ready to see your new home?"

* * *

 

Jenny walked slowly up the ramp before all of them, and the Doctor and Rose followed her close behind, his arm draped around Rose's shoulders as he watched Jenny with wonder. "She's called the TARDIS. Time and Relative Dimension in Space." He explained as someone, either Martha or Donna, closed the doors behind them.

"Is that because it's so much bigger on the inside?" She asked, and pointing to the ceiling. From the moment Jenny stepped inside the TARDIS was humming with happiness, glee, and a bit of smugness. It was clear that she knew what she was doing, and when she was sure no one was looking Rose sent a glare to the ceiling. The time machine would not respond.

"She's that, among other things." The Doctor said as he moved to the console. Rose did the same, assisting him in getting them back to the right date in 2008, just outside the factory a few moments after they left.

As she co-piloted, Rose felt the TARDIS reassure her in her mind, sending her encouragement that Rose completely understood the reason for. She glanced at Jenny again who'd taken a spot on the jumpseat, looking around the space. When the ship landed, Rose pulled her gaze away and turned to Martha.

"Here we are." She said.

"Yeah." She nodded once, stepping up and hugging her tightly. "I know we've had our differences, and there's Donna on board now, but if you need to talk."

"Same for you." Rose replied as she and Martha parted.

"Here, I'll walk you out," The Doctor said as he came up beside Rose, smiling at Martha who nodded in return.

From across the room, Rose met Donna's eye, and she nodded slightly, sending an encouraging smile Rose's way before she followed the Doctor and Martha out the TARDIS doors.

When they shut, Rose took a deep breath, moved to the jumpseat, and sat beside a very nervous looking Jenny. She studied her, swallowing back the fear as she noticed the very Tyler-like details the Doctor pointed out.

"I never wanted to be a Mum," Rose confessed straight away, Jenny nodding in understanding though she looked pained. "I don't even think I'll be good at it. But I love your father more than anything, went through some pretty extreme measures to make sure I'd always be there for him. And while I wouldn't have ever expected this," She took a deep breath. "I'll try my best to be the Mum you deserve. The kinda Mum he's always believed I'd be. 'S not going to be perfect, but," She reached out, took Jenny's hand and froze.

For a very split second Rose felt glee. And while Jenny's hands were cool there was a humming of heat between them as something in Rose's mind began to settle. The TARDIS showed her an image of two links connecting, and she understood.

"There's a humming in my head." Jenny said. "Kinda happy sounding."

"That's the TARDIS." Rose said with a smile, and while still holding Jenny's hand she explained a bit more about the ship. And as Jenny's eyes lit with wonder, something took root in Rose's heart that she knew she'd have a hard time denying.

Whether or not there was a biological connection after all, Jenny was her daughter too, regardless if Rose wanted her to be or not.

And she was surprised by how much that didn't scare her anymore.


	15. The Crimson Witch pt 1

Tim Latimer could truly say he'd seen things, man, and some stuff. Born with something his aunt called "the sight", he'd gone through life knowing things about other people's lives that he really shouldn't. He could sense people's secrets, what their future held, and on rare occasions he was able to see things that never happened, but could have.

And on top of that boat load of crazy, he knew aliens. Well, an alien and his modified human girlfriend that Tim was insanely close to considering reality said they'd only met briefly once or twice.

He lived through three Earth invasions, though the third was up for debate both in its existence and his survival. He'd spent about five minutes on a different planet three years ago, and a sentient time machine was quite fond of him. It all left Tim with a taste and acceptance for the strange and unknown that one normally wouldn't have.

Therefore, Tim was nearly always bored. School was all too easy, predictable. The people he called friends were just so normal, though he really couldn't complain he had friends these days. And if he had still lived with his aunt instead of his little top level bachelor pad, Tim was pretty sure he'd have gone insane. He watched the stars nearly every night, sometimes imagining he'd caught a glimpse of the blue box in the sky, but he knew it was just wishful thinking.

It may not have happened in reality, may have been a hell that gave him nightmares, but he often wished he could go back to the time when it was just him and Wolf Girl. Walking across the country, telling stories and sharing a laugh. He wished for a day when he would see her again, see the Doctor again. He wanted them back, both of them, the two that saved him from his dreary life in multiple ways.

Damn it, he should have never turned down that offer to go with them. Again.

Walking home from the bar on the cold, wet Saturday night, Tim's thoughts were on them. A partial buzz usually left his mind a little more open, and he screamed at them as loudly as he could mentally to hurry up and come back for him already. Even just for a visit. It'd been about a year, couldn't they just drop by to say hi?

He was about to step out into the street to cross the road, but stopped with his foot hanging off the sidewalk. Tim turned his head abruptly left just as the car sped around the corner, turning left without so much as slowing for the stop sign. Water from the road sprayed up and soaked him, his leather jacket protecting his torso but his jeans were now heavy and he was regretting his lack of belt.

"Crazy asshole!" Tim shouted, stepping out and crossing the road. He was nearly to the next block when he noticed that damn car coming around the corner again. He peeked in the window, seeing a bunch of dicks from the University, guys he knew to get drunk and see what they could get away with, speeding down the road again. He reached into his pocket, grabbed his damp cell phone, ready to call the police when he heard it: the sickening sound of someone getting hit by a car going too fast to stop. He'd heard it once, in another life, and it made his stomach flip then even though he knew the woman he cradled as she died was going to come back.

Tim ran, seeing the pale body in the glow of a street light with no sign of the assholes who hit her. Because it was a her, he could tell. He flipped open his phone, was two-thirds of the way through calling for help when he paused. A figure dressed in red darted out to the body, circled it carefully while keeping its head bowed, and then knelt beside it. Tim snapped his phone shut, his mind racing as he watched the figure kneel slowly down beside the dead girl. She reached inside her robes, because after a couple steps closer Tim could see it was both a her and it was robes she was wearing, and pulled something out. He watched, and the body of the girl glimmered orange. The one in robes stood up, and for a moment he was sure he'd been seen.

Frozen with fear, Tim could barely breath until the girl in Robes ran off, dashing behind a building. A flash of white light came from where she disappeared, and it acted as a catalyst for Tim's feet to move again.

He ran to the girl in the street, still laying there, but this time he heard crying. He knelt down beside her, looking into her scared, pained brown eyes. "Help me, please." She begged, and he glanced down to see her body was utterly mangled. He opened his phone again, hit that last '1', and hit call.

"911, what's your emergency?" The voice came from the other end.

"Corner of Pleasant and Main." He said. "There was a hit and run, and she's awake. It's bad." He added, because there was no point in hiding what he was sure this pour girl knew.

"I can't feel my legs. Oh god," She shouted loudly before crying hysterically.

"Help is on the way." The voice on the other end said, and it was mere seconds later that Tim heard the sirens coming down the road.

He stayed with her until the medics arrived, then cleared the way but stood nearby to watch over her. Police came and asked questions, and all Tim could tell them was what happened to him, and what he heard.

He couldn't tell them about the girl in red, the various glowing lights, or anything else that would be too hard to believe. These were people who chalked alien's bombing the city up to a Halloween prank gone wrong. People who never lived through the Toclafane or Harold Saxon's reign of terror. They'd never understand, would send him to hospital with the young woman but place him in the mental ward. The truth is out there was a line from a TV show and not a cold, hard fact like he knew it really was.

So Tim watched, and waited, and when he finally felt he could walk home and not miss another detail of what was going on, he did. And with every step he thought hard. He willed his mind to reach across the stars and somehow connect with those that could help. He willed it, wished it, whatevered it to find the Doctor and Wolf Girl and pull them back to him.

Because if there was one thing Tim knew it was this: that was alien. It was messed up. And where there was messed up alien shit, a certain Time Lord had to come and make it right.

* * *

 

"Dad! Mum! Aunt Donna has breakfast ready!" Jenny called through the bedroom door the TARDIS thankfully started locking a month ago. Rose startled at the sound of the knock, and the Doctor groaned as he placed his forehead between her shoulder blades before kissing her bareback quickly.

"For a Time Lord, she's not very good at the timing," He grumbled as he rolled onto his back, the mood of the morning gone after that disturbance.

Rose flipped around on to her other side to look at him. "She comes by it honestly."

"Oi!" He said indignantly, making Rose laugh before smiling with her tongue between her teeth. "I have excellent timing. And don't you dare start, that was one time."

She giggled, reaching over an lacing her fingers together with his, his frown melting into a warm smile as she apologized for the tease through their touch, then showed him all the other things Jenny shared with her father that warmed Rose's heart.

Motherhood. It wasn't at all like she envisioned, but then again the circumstances were entirely different from what would be the norm Rose thought she'd have to be subjected to. Jenny was full grown in a lot of ways, but the machine lacked a lot of what Rose would have considered basic knowledge. It was sadly obvious almost immediately that no one really expected the progenations to live longer than a day, two tops. While Rose was showing Jenny her quarters, a beautiful room with a TARDIS blue door marked with her name in Gallifreyan, there had been questions. Like what was the purpose of the shower in the attached bathroom, and what in the Universe were the feminine products under the sink about? So Rose, thanking the Universe in turn that the Doctor wasn't about to have this conversation with his little girl, sat her down and gave her a run down about hygiene, including what to possibly expect once a month. Jenny, the poor thing, looked terrified as it was, at that moment Rose couldn't possibly explain to her  _why_  she'd have to go through the monthly horror. That conversation came about a week later when Donna pointed out at breakfast (with the evilest grin yet) that Jenny didn't understand why sometimes it took so long for Mum and Dad to get out of bed. And while the conversation went surprisingly smooth with very little blushing, it did start the debate on what they should learn about the genetics of their daughter.

A part of them both didn't want to know everything, yet the mannerisms Jenny had that were so very Rose would always make them waver. Just how Time Lord Jenny was the Doctor desperately wanted to know, but he'd voiced his fear that he'd be disappointed if she didn't quiet make the half way point. So they left it, agreeing that they'd just discover things along the way.

"So where should we go today?" He asked, scooting closer to her in the bed until they were pressed together. "Introduce Jenny to the wonder and beauty that is Christmas, say London in the 1800's? Old fashioned kind? Or maybe we can jump to New York in the latter 2200's?"

"Could," Rose considered before he gently pushed her backward.

"Or maybe we could teach her about some Universal history, take a trip to the Museum planet. Does have a thirst for knowledge, her."

"Doctor?" Rose whispered, running her hands up his back. "If this is going where I think you're trying to make it I'd stop talking about Jenny."

"Quite right," He said as he grinned. "So where were we before we were interrupted?" He asked in a low, sultry voice.

There was a pound on the door. "Oi, you two, outta bed!" Donna shouted. "Make a nice, family meal and I expect the  _whole_  family to be there."

He grinned. "Aunt Donna's getting impatient," He teased, knowing the ginger couldn't hear him. Rose rolled her eyes as he got up. She followed, the two getting dressed in silence. Him in his brown suit with a blue oxford, her in jeans and a purple t-shirt. When they left their bedroom hand in hand they discovered the galley right across the hall.

"Morning!" Jenny greeted them cheerfully, and Rose felt the same shock in the Doctor as she found in herself.

Jenny had essentially taken on Rose's wardrobe from her early days with the Doctor, and every day it had been equally as surprising to find how much she looked like Rose. Today Jenny dressed like Rose had been the second time they'd encountered the slitheen, complete with the two braids and the scarf.

She felt the calm washing over her, though the Doctor's hearts were beating hard enough that she felt his pulse in his palm.

"What's wrong, you two?" Donna asked cautiously. "You look like you're seeing a ghost."

Neither replied.

"What?" Jenny asked.

"Nothing," The Doctor said quickly, pulling Rose to join Donna and Jenny at the table.

Rose sat by her daughter and looked her over out of the corner of her eye as she added pancakes to her plate. Jenny glanced over with a nervous smile. "The TARDIS showed me your old room," She said nervously. "I, umm, noticed the pictures on the mirror of the vanity and thought … well, I'd hoped that you would be okay with this."

"I am," Rose said quickly, meaning it, too, despite how scary it was.

Jenny smiled, placing her hand on Rose's. The jolt still came as a surprise, a quick flick of emotion, a hum that reminded Rose very much of her contact with the Doctor when he'd been changed into a human just after forming their partial bond.

"Who were the blokes in the picture?" Jenny asked, reaching into her pocket and pulling out the photo, handing it to Rose.

She smiled in spite of herself, looking at the Doctor in his previous body and the way he stood closer to her than Jack had, and the two sandwiched her in a way that kept Mickey at bay.

"Who took this picture, do you remember?" Rose asked, handing the photo to the Doctor who had inhaled his breakfast.

He wiped his fingers on a cloth napkin before taking the picture, staring at it. "I think Mickey was gonna, but then that old Lady, the one who saw us all come out of the TARDIS together, I think she offered to do it."

"Mickey?" Donna asked, likely pointing to him in the photo.

"Yeah," The Doctor said before leaning over to Jenny. "That's your Uncle Mickey," He said, tapping the picture roughly. "He's in another universe now."

"Does he have a brother?" Donna asked, brow furrowed.

"No, Mick's was an only child." Rose replied as she took the picture from the Doctor.

Donna nodded slowly, but still seemed confused. She opened her mouth to say something, then paused. When she glanced up and met Rose's eye, she said, "But I've seen him. The night of the Adipose. He was watching the scene, and he looked at me, right at me. I know it was him."

Rose looked to the Doctor, but he seemed just as confused as she was.

"So who's that, then, ex boyfriend?" Jenny asked, seeming to sense the odd tension around them and returned her attention to the picture, pointing to the Doctor.

Rose smiled warmly, her heart humming happily as she looked into those ice blue eyes and took in that genuine smile. "That's your Dad." She said.

Jenny's eyes went wide and her head shot up to look at the Doctor.

"How can that be Dad?" Jenny asked, and the Doctor smirked as he got up, taking away the dishes.

"I'm much more handsome like this, aren't I?" He said over his shoulder.

"How is that Dad!?" Jenny repeated, her voice going up a couple octaves. "Is that going to happen to me? Am I going to just randomly change?"

And there it was, the one thing Rose knew the Doctor didn't want to discuss with what was essentially their new born daughter. She looked at him, seeing the storm in his eyes. Not the one started from anger and rage, but the one brought on by sorrow and fear.

"Mum?" Jenny asked, and she couldn't help but look at her. As mixed as Rose's feelings were about being a mother, she felt her heart break for her little girl who looked at her with her father's eyes, sheer terror reflecting in them.

"It's complicated," Rose said softly, brushing back a loose strand of Jenny's hair and feeling that odd tingle again.

Before anything more could be said on the subject, the TARDIS chimed.

"What was that?" Rose asked.

"She wants attention," The Doctor said, equally confused. "What is it, Old Girl?" He asked, darting out of the galley.

"Should we?" Donna asked, gesturing at the door. Rose nodded, and the three women got up and followed the Doctor into the console room.

"The TARDIS has picked up a call for help." The Doctor said, brow furrowed as he squinted at the monitor with his brainy specs in place. "But it's not a normal distress signal. There's no message, no readings."

"Psychic paper?" Rose asked, and he shook his head.

"Nope, checked that. There's only lines." He replied. "Tell you what, though. It's coming from Earth." He looked to Jenny. "Fancy going to the planet your Mum and Aunt Donna are from?"

Jenny's eyes lit up, the conversation about regeneration being pushed aside.

"Aunt Donna," Donna said with a shake of her head, and slight grin pulling on her lips. "Never thought I'd be called that, let me tell ya."

"Never thought I'd be Mum, so I know the feeling." Rose whispered to the ginger woman, getting a chuckle out of her before she went to help the Doctor at the console.

"Can I help?" Jenny asked, her eagerness causing her to bounce a bit as she looked over the controls.

"Not this time, Love." The Doctor replied as he and Rose moved effortlessly around the console together, their dance perfected after years of flying together. "But later, when we aren't answering calls for help."

When the ship landed with a gentle thud, Rose instantly felt the excited, eager, happy hum of the TARDIS. She glanced to the Doctor who stared at the coordinates as if he was trying to decipher something. "Where are we?" She asked him.

"Earth," he said, "Canada. Where we were when I was human." He said, looking at her with confusion for a only a brief second. Rose, however, was not confused, and her grin stretched wide. Canada, where they were when he was human. Which could only mean. "Oh!" He said, his own smile growing.

Rose bolted for the doors, throwing them open. As she looked around the deserted parking lot, her heart started hammering with fear when she remembered it was a distress call that brought them here.

She heard the doors behind her creek open as she took a couple steps forward, looking around at the tall, brick buildings with their walls covered in graffiti.

A chain link fence rattled from somewhere over her shoulder, and she turned toward the sound and spotted the dumpster. She took a step off to the side, craning to see, when she heard that wonderful voice curse before Tim Latimer stumbled into view.

He grinned, one side going higher than the other. "Well look what the Storm dragged in. The Big, Bad Wolf." He said casually.

They stood there for a moment, simply staring before the both half squealed and ran toward one another, hugging each other tightly and rocking back and forth.

* * *

 

"What's all that about?" Donna asked the Doctor, taking in the young man clinging to Rose, noting that they looked about the same age and seemed to have a familiar ease between them. "Just going to let him hang all over your woman like that?"

"Oh, Tim wouldn't even dream of it, would you Tim?" The Doctor said loudly, and Donna noticed the small smile tugging at the corner of Spaceman's lips as he put his hands in his pockets. The young man pulled back from Rose, looking at the Doctor with respect and admiration.

"Gross." Tim replied before coming up to the Doctor, and the two of them embraced in that weird way men do, all slapping rough with hard pats on the back and a quick withdraw before anyone could dare challenge their masculinity. "How ya doin', Doc?"

"I'm wonderful, Tim." He replied, looking at the young man like, well, Donna didn't know how to decipher it. Perhaps as a mentor, or a father figure would. Brother maybe.

Tim, the punk rock looking thing that was just as skinny as the alien beside her, looked Donna square in the eye. "The most important woman in the Universe, Miss Donna Noble. How the hell are you?" He asked her, extending his hand for her to shake, which she took cautiously.

"How do you know my name?" She asked, glancing first at the Doctor, than to Rose, both who didn't give any hint that they knew.

"I just know shit." Tim replied with a shrug.

"Ah, so if you just know shit, how am I the most important woman in the Universe?" She challenged.

The young man simply shrugged. "Just how my mind sees you." He gestured to Rose and the Doctor who were now standing together again, hand in hand. "Storm Boy, Wolf Girl, Most important woman in the Universe." He said like it was no big deal at all, and that Donna had to have known this already.

How was she the most important woman in the universe? Best temp in Chiswick, yeah, absolutely. But that wasn't all that hard to achieve, it didn't have any weight or significance behind it. She could be called that, and the name Donna Noble still wouldn't mean squat to anyone who wasn't looking for someone to hire temporarily.

"What about me?" Jenny asked, pulling Donna out of her thoughts.

And, oh, wasn't this gonna be fun. Tim, little pale boy Tim, grew paler as he looked at pretty little Jenny. He looked her over, and Donna glanced over at the Doctor who either didn't pick up on such subtle hints or wasn't enough of a 'Dad' to care.

"I have no idea who you are." Tim eventually replied. "But I think I'd like to."

"Tim," Donna said, shifting to stand beside the twiggy thing. "It's Tim, right?" She asked as she dropped her arm around the tiny thing and he nodded. "This is Jenny. She's Storm boy and Wolf Girl's daughter." She said, and the poor kid's eyes went wide. She looked over her shoulder at the Doctor, unable to resist the smile pulling on her lips. "Do Time Lords carry shot guns?"

"Why would I ever have gun?" The Doctor asked with utter disgust as Rose started giggling, trying to cover her mouth as best she could.

"'Cause somehow threatening your daughter's boyfriend with a sonic screwdriver just doesn't seem to have the same effect."

"Whoa!" Tim said, stepping out of Donna's arm and putting his hands up in front of him. "Whoa, no, no, what ever she's saying that's not, no, I mean, I'm sorta seeing someone already, and I wouldn't. I mean, she's alien, right? No offense to Jenny, you seem nice, and all, but I'm fairly certain that…. I mean, Wolf Girl, she went under some mods, so she's not all, and I mean there's laws, right? Laws on that sorta thing?"

"Alright, well," The Doctor's voice boomed, and everyone turned to him. "We got a distress call, and as lovely as it is to catch up and all, what exactly brought us here? Tim, do you know?"

"Oh you have no idea." He said.

And then he relayed the tale of a girl who died and was brought back to life somehow.

"And she's not the only one," he said. "I went to see her in the hospital, and she was in what they called a special ward. They had to rework her bones, because it was almost like they were partly healed when she was brought in, and she wasn't the only one who came like that. There's another girl who's constantly stoned. Lia, the girl who was hit by the car, she said that the other chick was brought in fully conscious and alive after throwing back a bottle of codeine laced painkillers. She keeps mumbling about an angel in red not letting her die. And this other dude, electrocuted, can't feel anything in his body, it's all gone numb like he said he felt before he blacked out. All three of them died, all of them came back to life, none of them are quite right anymore. And there are a couple, apparently, physically recovered but went a little nuts. They're in the psych ward."

"A woman in red, you said?" The Doctor asked, the look on his face tipping Donna off that there was something suspicious about that.

"Yeah," Tim said. "She's alien, isn't she?" He asked as if it were the most common thing in the Universe.  _Then again, spend any time with those two and it probably was,_ Donna thought to herself, snorting out loud.

"Maybe," The Doctor said, though she could tell he thought so. "We'll need to investigate of course." He looked down at Rose. "Whaddya say, Shiver? Poke around, see what's what?"

"Let's go, Shake." She said with a decisive nod.

"Shiver and Shake?" Donna asked teasingly.

"Right you are, Quake." The Doctor quipped back as he glanced around.

"Quake?" Donna asked.

"Yeah, why not?" He said without second thought. "Allons-y!" And without any further explanation he and Rose turned around and went on their way, Jenny quickly following her parents, and latching on to her father's arm as she leaned around him to ask her mother things.

"You were shitting me when you said Jenny's their kid, right?" Tim asked as he and Donna moved to follow the family.

"No," Donna shook her head. "It's all alien, and technology, and weird, but all so true."

"Huh," Tim said. "I can honestly say that I did not see  _that_  coming." He said, eyes still wide.

"And you see things, do you?" Donna asked, more amused than anything.

Tim glanced up at her from the corner of his eye. "Saw you coming, Time Lady." He grinned cheekily up at her.

It made Donna pause, but only for a beat. Kid was weird, that's all. Weird and maybe a little alien himself, who knew.

And the thing was, Donna didn't want to know. Didn't want to know, right now, why this kid had a bit of reverence in his eye, or why he said the things he did, even if it did make her feel as if he was telling the absolute truth.

* * *

 

Psychic paper declaring him an expert in the field of strange medical conditions, the Doctor led the group through to the special ward on fifth floor of Queen's General Hospital. From what Rose had seen so far, it wasn't all that different from any other hospital she'd seen in her life. No cat nurses, always a good sign. A little concerning that it only took a quick call up to the ward and reception had waved them on with directions to the elevator. The Doctor had been handed a special key for access which he promptly handed to Rose.

"Already got a special key, me." He said as the lift doors closed. He put his sonic to the panel, and they started to move.

"I feel like we should have had name badges," Donna said as she patted down her white lab coat, courtesy of the TARDIS wardrobe. "I mean, psychic paper works well for you, but what are the rest of us supposed to be?"

"My interns." He said, sticking his hands in his pockets and looking over his shoulder at Donna. "Bit old to be a student, aren't you?"

"Oi, watch it, Spaceman, or you'll be glad you're already in a hospital."

The lift doors opened, and the scent of disinfectant hit Rose far stronger than it had in the lobby. There was a sign that stated all visitors had to sign in, and it was recommended to wear gloves and masks though none of the patients appeared contagious.

"You the expert that called about downstairs?" A brash older woman with salt and pepper hair tied back in a bun asked after they were barely off the lift. She was short, and very round, her pastel scrubs with smiling teddy bears seeming too cheerful for his disposition.

"Yep! That's me. I'm the Doctor, by the way." He said with his normal cheer.

"I figured." She said, and Rose was pretty sure the nurse was a second away from rolling her eyes at him. "Follow me. Pretty sure you and your interns haven't seen anything like this before."

The floor was calm and quiet, with maybe only four other nurses around. There were no visitors coming and going, though there were five patient rooms lit up. It was all very generic, very institutional with no personal touches or decorations anywhere.

"Unusually quiet," Rose noted. "Not visiting hours, I take it?"

"Visitors who come here are usually unable to stay long or handle the situation. Normally this floor is teaming with people, but given the circumstances we've rerouted all non-emergent cases to the Harbor Side so we can clear a floor for this. Any all cases like these ones come here."

"I thought there were only three on this ward?" Tim asked, and the nurse looked at him and did a double take.

"Didn't think family or friends could be on cases like these." She asked as she stopped outside a patient's door.

"I just happened to be on the scene," Tim replied. "After I saw Lia, I had to tell my attending about it."

The nurse narrowed her gaze on him but then turned away. Rose gave him a twisted grin, trying not let loose the giggle as Tim noticeably breathed a sigh of relief.

"We had two more come in in the last couple days," The nurse continued as she stopped at the nurses station and handed the Doctor a stack of files. "One was a fatal GSW that actually wasn't, the other was fall."

"Ooh, hate falling." The Doctor grimaced, not noticing the annoyed glare the nurse gave him.

"Anyway, feel free to ask the patients anything, just don't be too broken up if they don't respond." And with that, she headed for the elevator mumbling about a break.

"Alright, Tim, let's meet Lia first, shall we?" He suggested, and Tim pointed to the center room.

Inside a lovely girl with dark brown hair and almond eyes stared at the TV, her whole body in a cast, her neck in a brace.

"Hello Lia," The Doctor said softly as he walked up to where she could see him. He smiled softly. "I'm the Doctor, this is Rose, Donna, Jenny, and you already know Tim."

"Doctor what?" She asked, clearing her throat.

"Just the Doctor." He said as Rose moved to the bedside table and offered Lia the cup with the straw. She looked grateful to Rose and took the straw in her mouth, taking a long pull with a look of relief.

"Voice sounded a little hoarse." Rose said in way of explanation, setting the cup down when Lia was done.

"Nurse Jeanne is really the only one who can be around any of us for her whole shift. The night crowd is broken up into one hours shifts. Sometimes its hard to get any help."

"You don't have any family who can come tend to you?" Donna asked, and Lia shook her head.

"My mom is all I have and she's out of town. I moved here to come to school. Have a few friends but they got weirded out."

"Weirded out?" Donna looked her over, "It's just a cast, how could they find that so weird?"

"The energy," Tim said, looking up at Donna as he stood on the other side of Lia. "Don't you feel it? That weird hum in the air, something making the hairs on your arms stand on end?"

Rose didn't really notice it until he pointed it out. There was a charge, very subtle, but not all that strange.

She noticed Donna narrowing her eyes like she was trying to focus, then nodded slightly.

"Lia, why don't you tell me what you remember from the night of your accident?" The Doctor asked her.

She shook her head. "I really don't remember anything except pain, and Tim. I remember him because he called for help."

The Doctor looked thoughtful, and maybe a little uncomfortable. "I want to do something to help you remember for a moment that will tell me what I need to know. It's not going to be pleasant for you, but I'll make you forget again right after, okay?" He asked. Lia took a deep breath, and nodded slightly. "Close your eyes." He instructed gently, and Rose watched him put his fingers to her temples.

"What's he doing?" Jenny asked quietly, sensing the need to keep silent.

"He's entering her mind telepathically." Rose explained, which only made Jenny seem more confused. "Your Dad can read other peoples thoughts if he does what he's doing to her right now. He and I have a bond where so long as there's touch we can communicate."

She looked thoughtful. "Am I able to do that?" She asked.

Rose tapped her temples. "Try."

Jenny put her fingers to Rose's temples eagerly, and while there was the usual jolt and a small hum in Rose's mind there was no Jenny.

"Guess that's one way I'm not Time Lord."

"Might grow into it." The Doctor said as he pulled his fingers away from Lia's head, and she blinked her eyes open.

The young girl looked around the room. "Have you done it yet?" She asked.

"Yes," He replied with a gentle smile. "Lia, you've actually been very helpful. I understand you're not in a lot of pain?"

She shook her head. "Started getting feeling back in my legs, too." She noted.

"That's brilliant." He said sincerely, though Rose could see the apprehension in his eyes. "Thank you, Lia. I may be back."

She nodded, smiling at them all as they filed out of the room.

The Doctor systematically went into each room. The pill swallower, who Tim said was barely coherent, seemed to have a bit more wits about her. The electrocution guy said he was starting to get the feeling back but it was pretty painful and he was put on strong pain meds which only numbed him again. Rose went in to the gun shot wound victim's room as the others stayed outside when they noticed the bandage was wrapped around the man's head. She opted to stay out of the fall victims room, having not experienced such a death herself and not really wanting to know what she might have looked like. So with out knowing for absolute certainty as she didn't accompany him in the last room, Rose simply assumed that the Doctor read everyone's minds. After all, the two men they had talked to said the same thing as Lia: they only remembered waking up after they thought for sure they'd be dead.

"Tim, I need a place to look over these files away from here." The Doctor said as he took the patient files and rolled them up, sticking them inside his blazer. "Know of anywhere?"

"Got just the place." Tim replied, gesturing to the elevator with his head.

* * *

 

An instant rush of memories both good and bad flooded over Rose as she stepped inside Tim's flat. Three years ago Earth time, this was John Smith's flat. She had spent many evenings here, on the very couch in the middle of the room and on the lounge chairs sitting on the balcony. Her and the Doctor cooked in that galley when he didn't know he was actually a superior being with dreadful cooking skills, and in this space they had talked about their lives, both real and fake, and fell in love with the different sides of themselves they had to play.

"I know this place," The Doctor partially shouted as he looked around the room. "I lived here."

"You're shitting me." Tim said as he turned to the Doctor. "It's stupid close to Uni, but there was always another reason that this place pulled at me, and I never got why."

"Well, you would be drawn here." The Doctor said as he moved to the small desk that was once sort of his and took out the patient files. "Drawn to the energy I would have left, if you will."

"Oh, nice, I'm a sorta stalker."

"You lived in a flat." Donna asked.

"Yeah," He replied absently, files already spread out over the desk for his perusing.

"Well," Tim said, clapping his hands together. "I'm not going to lie, I have nothing in my fridge and I can flat out tell you that I don't have tea so I'mma make a run for the store."

"I'll come with you," Rose said. "Leave the Doctor to do his deciphering."

He looked up at her with a sly grin, specs already on as he the files were spread over Tim's desk. "I believe I'm deducting."

"What ever you want to call it." She replied.

"Can I come?" Jenny asked earnestly.

Rose glanced back at the Doctor who shrugged. "Can't see why not, unless your Mum wanted to talk to Tim alone."

"Nothing she can't hear," Rose assured though she wasn't completely certain that was going to be the case.

Jenny had questions when Rose came back to life, having understood from her machine given knowledge that dead was dead and it was an honor. So she and the Doctor explained to their daughter as best they could what it all meant. But she hadn't seen Rose's dark side, and they didn't explain to her nor had an encounter that would demonstrate just how dangerous she could be.

Tim had only been witness to part of it, and with the Year that Never Was now more of a vision than memory to him, Rose wasn't certain what would come up.

"Alright, off we go then. Doc, Donna, make yourselves at him while we're out, 'kay?" Tim said, twirling his keys on his fingers a moment before opening the flat door for the two blondes.

"Thanks, Tim," Donna called with a smile and a wave as they call headed out.

* * *

 

"Are you just going to stare, or are you going to talk?" The Doctor asked without looking up from the papers spread out on the desk, taking Donna by surprise.

Yeah, she'd been staring for the last twenty minutes because this whole situation was entirely barmy. For one, she was sitting in a flat maintained by twenty year old boy without being concerned over what surface she could sit on. For another thing, this flat had apparently at one point been the Doctor's when he was human. And oh, didn't  _that_  raise a whole bunch of questions.

"What do you mean you were human?" She started with that, and the Doctor looked up at her in confusion for a moment. The light came on behind them as he glanced about the room.

"Right, said that, didn't I? Had to hide from some aliens, used a machine on the TARDIS to rewrite my biology. Made myself human until it was safe. Well, until it was safer to be a Time Lord again. Went by the name of John Smith, posed as a High School teacher. Well, I say posed but I really didn't remember who I was."

"Didn't remember?" Donna asked, leaning toward her from her spot on the oddly comfortable couch.

"Oh yes. Chameleon arch took my Time Lord essence out, and with it all my memories. Replaced them with fake ones. Couldn't even recall who Rose was yet still managed to fall in love with her." He shifted a bit in his chair. "Was also still very much about helping others, too. It's how I met Tim. He was picked on a lot, was considered a bit too odd. Probably because he's a psychic, well, not really, not entirely. Certainly not a prophet or anything but he does see things that are usually spot on and are either secret or yet to happen. Also a slight bit telepathic in that he can receive thoughts."

Donna gapped at him. "Psychic." She said the word like it left a disgusting taste in her mouth. "What in the world am I doing with you, then?" She asked.

"Sorry?" He furrowed his brow, blinking rapidly.

"Rose is the love of your life, and Martha's a bloody brilliant Doctor. This kid is psychic, and Rose mentioned your friend Jack is immortal. What makes me good enough to come aboard the SS Special Ship?"

"You're brilliant." He said without missing a beat, looking serious at his response. She waited for the punchline, the moment when the Time Lord would start laughing and pointing and tell her the truth. But it never came, and Donna started to fidget. "Oh, you really don't believe that, do you?" He said, turning the chair more toward her. "Donna, when Rose came aboard she was just a nineteen year old girl who made me feel less lonely. Martha was a med student. And Jack was a dirty con man. Tim's never traveled with me because he hasn't been able to. But the thing is, Donna, I didn't take them all on because of what they became. I took them on for the same reasons I did you, because I only take the best."

Donna blushed, smiling though she didn't want to. "Best temp in Chiswick." She said barely louder than a whisper, laughing at her self-deprecation.

"Much more than that." The Doctor said, smiling genuinely and warmly. "Easily my best mate aside from Rose."

"Yeah?"

"Oh yes," He said confidently. "The two of you keep me in line, that's for sure. I imagine …." He trailed off, utter sadness clouding his eyes. "I imagine if I'd lost Rose all that time ago, you probably would've been the only person in the Universe that could have made me happy." He glanced at her, eyes widening as he noted how Donna's jaw had dropped and her nostrils flared. "Not, not, not like  _that_. Blimey, no, never. You're like a sister to me, is all I meant. Probably the only one who could manage to make sure I didn't wallow about, is all."

She chuckled, relieving the tension and getting him to smile too. He did have her worried for a moment, admittedly.

"What do you mean if you'd lost Rose?" She asked, because they were on a roll here and she doubted he'd open up like this to her again.

He took off his glasses and set them on top of the papers. "The day we met you it had been two weeks to the day she lost her mother to the other Universe. I almost lost her that day, too, only to something much worse."

Donna smiled thinly. "But you have each other now."

"Yes we do," He said, grinning again. "And maybe it wasn't just the Huons pulling you in that brought us all together. Maybe it was something else leading you to us."

"Oh, you mean like fate?" Donna mused.

The Doctor shrugged, putting his glasses back on. "Could be." He said as the door unlocked. "Could always ask Tim."

"Ask me what?" The young man in question replied as he tossed keys on a small table in the entryway before carrying four bags of groceries to the kitchen area.

"Fate," The Doctor said loosely, returning his attention to the papers.

"What kinda we talking about here? Like it was fate for me to walk to the Earth with Wolf Girl even though it technically never happened, or fate that Ginger there is traveling with you two?"

Donna glared at the Doctor who smiled smugly back at her.

"Have any luck?" Rose asked as she moved to stand behind the Doctor, putting her hands on his shoulders. He Instantly reached up and snagged one hand in his, and Rose looked momentarily startled. "Oh." She said.

"Oh?" Donna repeated. "Mind filling in the rest of the class?"

The Doctor turned to her and beamed. "See what I mean, brilliant you are. Maybe even a bit foresighted like Timmy here because, Donna Noble, class is exactly the place we should be going."

"Hmm, you two, aliens, and a school. No this isn't ringing any bells for me at all." Tim said as he folded his arms and leaned against the kitchen counter.

"Every single patient in that ward has a tie to the University. All students."

"All of them?" Tim asked incredulously. "One of them's, like, forty."

"And he went back to get his Doctorate." The Doctor shrugged. "Education doesn't stop at a certain age. I'm nearly 910 and I've yet to stop wanting to learn new things."

"Okay, sure, they're all students. They're all linked up to the University, and I'm scared when you say 'the' you mean mine. Which will, of course, be the case. But still, why do we need to head there to keep searching?" Tim asked, the kid wearing a grin the whole time while trying to act like he couldn't believe it was happening and failing miserably.

"Because, Tim, Tim, Timothy. Our girl in red is finding people who are about to die, who's time lines are nearing their end, and she's bringing them back to life. My guess is she's finding them there. Question is, why?"

Tim's smile stretched wide and he glanced slightly away from the Doctor. Rose was apparently smiling as well, and Donna couldn't help but join in.

"This is when we start running, yeah?" Jenny asked eagerly.

"Very likely," The Doctor said. "Allons-y."

* * *

 

The University was buzzing with life when the five of them stepped on to the campus. Tim was instantly on high alert, looking around at every red-wearing girl that passed him while trying to be cool.

But he couldn't.

Because holy shit, the Doctor and Wolf Girl were back in his territory where aliens were once again wrecking havoc on his life, albeit indirectly. But even still, Tim felt back, fresh, like he hadn't felt in a long time.

Of course, his mind was also buzzing way stronger than it had before their arrival, and he'd been nearing a headache since they landed but didn't care. His "sight" was flaring constantly, but the images were too fleeting for him to really get look at them.

"So, Tim. Where's the laboratories in this place?" The Doctor asked.

He stopped and looked up at the man he still considered a mentor after all this time. "I'm an English Major, how the fu- … hell am I supposed to know where the labs are?" He asked, smiling at the manic grin pulled on the Doctor's face.

"Language has improved." He teased. "But that doesn't solve the Lab dilemmas."

"So this is school." Jenny said, and it seemed all eyes were on the young blonde.

So, so very young. Too young. Jail bait young. While she was in awe at the grocery store, having never been in one before, Tim had managed to ask Rose how old she was.

"Born a little over a month ago," She'd replied, and that right there tampered down any interest he had had in the Time Lord and Wolf's daughter. Because while she was attractive, and kinda sweet, the age difference was a little hard to wrap his head around. Then again, about twenty years wasn't as significant when compared to eight hundred and eighty years.

"This is  _a_ school," The Doctor replied as he put his arm around his daughter. "It's not even a good school."

"Hey," Tim said indignantly.

"Well, for a human, maybe it is, but for a Time Lord it's merely a daycare. Might as well sit around and sing the 'ABCs' for all this school could do for her brain. No, Jenny, darling, there are much better schools in the Universe that could actually work with your potential should you be interested." He straightened his tie, glaring down a football player as he passed them with a leering glare at both the blondes in their entourage. "And where the Neanderthals won't be around to disturb you."

"Oh, is that an upgrade or a downgrade from 'stupid apes'?" Rose teased with her tongue between her teeth, and the Doctor sent her a loving glare.

"Yo, Mitchell," Tim called out as he spotted one of the science majors he knew leaving the school, starting to head back to the dorms. "Where're the labs?"

"Like I'd tell you," Mitchell replied, looking Tim up and down. "Likely blow the thing up for kicks."

"He's actually acting as my guide." The Doctor said, pulling that billfold with the blank paper out and flashing it to the student. "Doctor John Smith, guest lecturer and visiting professor. I'm trying to get a hold of a lab so I can prepare a demonstration for a talk I'm giving."

"Yeah, okay," Mitchell said, his brow furrowed. "Umm, fifth floor, left corridor. Four labs there, usually three of them are free but ones locked up pretty tight. Some sorta accident there or something, I dunno. Hey, when are you giving this talk? I don't remember hearing about it."

"It's a surprise," The Doctor grinned. "Can't tell you and spoil all the fun now, can I?"

"Right, okay. So why is Tim acting as your guide instead of someone from the department?" Mitchell questioned, and why hadn't Tim thought of that? Or the Doctor?

And just as he was going to try and blunder an answer, Wolf Girl stalked forward with a sly grin. "Tim's just doing a favor for his big sister." She said, ruffling his hair fondly. "John's my husband, and obviously we're not from around here so we wanted someone we know."

Mitchell raised an eyebrow. "How can you be his sister if you're British?"

"Half," Rose said like the guy was just plain stupid, which Tim knew to be fact after Mitchell had a couple beers. "Same Dad. He tended to get a little frisky on business trips. Can't say I like his mother, but always had a soft spot for Tim." She said, and Mitchell thankfully let it go.

As they entered the building, heading for the stairs, Tim turned to Rose. "You know my Mom's dead, right?"

"So's my Dad." She countered.

"'Kay, so, I guess that makes it all less, I dunno, slanderous."

"Sorry if I offended you," Rose said, reaching out and placing a hand on his shoulder to give it a squeeze.

He smirked. "Ya didn't."

"So," Jenny said. "Does this mean I should be calling you Uncle Tim?"

Tim stopped, whirled around, and looked Jenny right in her pretty brown eyes. "Fuck. No." He said firmly.

"Oi, language." The Doctor teased, grinning over at Tim.

"Can't be helped, Storm Boy. Sometimes you just need to say something as blunt as possible." Tim thrust his hands in his pockets. "So where exactly are we heading?"

"Where do you think." The Doctor said as he pulled his sonic screwdriver from inside his jacket pocket. "One lab locked up from an accident? All the resurrected having a connection to this place? I think we might just find what we're looking for in there."

Tim nodded in agreement, not having noticed the woman coming down the stairs in the opposite direction. She bumped him, hand brushing against his and pulled his attention.

"Sorry," he said as she mumbled her own apologies.

He blinked, then had to pause.

Gold light. Pain. Fire. Jenny. Wolf Girl being Wolf like. Girl in Red.

The images were fleeting but powerful, stronger than anything since he looked into Donna's eyes and saw her with a raw power he'd only ever witnessed in the Doctor. And as quick as they came, they were gone.

"Tim," Rose said, arm around his shoulders. "You alright?"

"Yeah," He swallowed. "Yeah, I'm fine." He added with a smile, barely able to look over at Jenny without remembering a very specific detail of what he saw.

The pretty little girl so new to the Universe burning in a golden light, withering in pain, and crying for her Dad.


	16. The Crimson Witch pt 2

_Click_.

The door opened after a few seconds with the sonic, and Donna followed the Doctor inside behind Tim and Rose, acting as a terrible buffer for Jenny. Truth was, she would have likely been able to take what ever was in that room better than Donna would, but she was now "Aunt" and she'd be damned if let something hurt the young girl.

"Oh ho, ho," The Doctor laughed gleefully as they took in the darkened room. The blinds were shut tight, the tables nearest the door covered in what looked like melted beakers and a layer of char as if there had been a fire. Tucked far enough in the back was a work station.

Funny looking thing, that work station. She wasn't a genius by any standards, but Donna had been fairly certain that rocks were meant to be in the geology department, not set in a something that looked like a tiny, metal slide and slanted slightly over a line of flames. Water was trickling over them from some slow flowing glass thingy that looked like a lopsided tear drop, passing over the rocks and dripping into a beaker on the other end. The final result had a smoke-like vapor pouring off of it reminding Donna of dry ice. At the other end of the table where small vials filled with the clear liquid.

"What is all this?" Rose asked as the Doctor circled the table with appreciation.

"Dangerous is what it is." He said, hands in his pockets as he bent and craned to examine every inch of the make-shift device. "Someone is trying very hard to mimic the Elixir of Life." He added.

"Sorry?" Donna said. "Elixir of what?" She inquired as she moved to stand off to the side and avoid the smoke like substance coming off the end. She didn't feel all that more comfortable standing next to the vials that Tim was now partly rummaging through.

"Elixir of life," The Doctor said, his gaze narrowed as he watched the liquid drip into the beaker at the end. "The Sisterhood of Karn, keeper of the sacred flame, would make it to extend their life. Also had some pretty strong effects on Time Lords, could help us through tough regenerations and heal us if need be. Crashed on their planet once and they tried to convince me I was dead to try and get me to change into someone to fight the war."

"War?" Tim asked,

"Time war," The Doctor said, looking at the boy from the corner of his eye. "Must have seen some of it." He said vaguely, to which Tim moved his head back and forth.

"I don't glimpse your past selves really. Only twice, I think, and they were a rushed blur. I do vaguely recall a dream about a war."

The Doctor nodded, standing up straight. "Between my people and the Dalek race." He said, looking at his feet. "I was avoiding fighting it, helping where I could. Then on one of these helpful trips I tried to save a young woman who didn't trust Time Lords. I almost died. Almost. But I could feel my body healing without the need to regenerate when the sisterhood woke me, tried to give me one of their potions to trigger a regeneration." He looked back down at the work station. "But they didn't exactly share, and they wouldn't give it away willy-nilly. Which may explain this little set-up, but now the question is why?"

"Something to extend life? Seems obvious doesn't it?"Donna asked, the Doctor's eyes falling on her curiously. "Not everyone's a bloody immortal alien, and not everyone comes back from the dead."

"No," The Doctor conceded. "But here in lies the problem, Donna: Who would be left to know about it? Me. Maybe the sisterhood if they miraculously survived the war, but they're the only ones who know how it's made. What minerals would be needed."

"Well someone figured it out." Rose pointed out. "People are coming back from the dead."

"Yeah," He said, his eyes growing stormy. "But they aren't coming back properly. Maybe that's an affect of the elixir used on them when it's not supposed to be, or maybe who ever is brewing this is out of their depth. Maybe they don't know what they're doing. But what I want to know is who they are and how they know about it in the first place."

"And why are they here?" Tim said, and Donna looked over her shoulder to see him picking up one of the vials and giving it a little shake. He glanced up and around at everyone. "Well, come on. Alien, right? So why Earth? Can't tell me there aren't better planets to do this sort of shite on?" He asked, tapping the vial on the table top.

"Probably," the Doctor nodded. "But before we can get that answer, we need to find out who they are."

"Telling me I need to die tonight?" Rose asked, and Donna looked at the older of the two blondes and seeing the fear in her eyes.

"What? No!" The Doctor said. "Gotta be cameras in the hallway, maybe we can just get a look at the face, go from there." He gestured toward the door, "Come on, let's go see if we can't find a way to get a hold of some security footage." He stepped to Rose, taking her hand in his and they two headed toward the door with Jenny bouncing along behind them.

"Hey, Most Important Woman," Tim said, and Donna noticed him handing her a vial. "Pocket this."

Donna laughed. "Seriously."

Tim shrugged. "Might come in handy." He said, gesturing the vial toward her once more.

Donna took it hesitantly. "Makes you say that?" She asked, eyeing him over.

"I just see shit." He said as he walked around the table and avoided her eyes.

A sudden dread formed in the pit of Donna's stomach as she looked down at the vial in her hand. It looked like nothing more than water with a bit of grit in the bottom, contained in a glass bottle small enough to fit in her blazer pocket. But the liquid was supposedly bringing people back from the dead, and Tim, while strange, could supposedly glimpse the past and future. Swallowing the lump in her throat, Donna stuffed the vial in her blazer, suddenly worried what kind of future she was about to face.

* * *

 

"So, do you like school?" Jenny asked Tim as she came and sat down beside him on the couch while the more experienced at solving alien shit gathered in the kitchen to discuss the idea of attempting to break into the school later. They had been denied access to the security footage, not surprising, and to Tim's knowledge they were only talking logistics of how they were gonna break in.

"It's not bad." Tim shrugged, crossing his arms as he realized how close Jenny was sitting next to him. His natural instinct was to put his arm on the back of the couch, but the last thing he wanted was for any of the other to think he was putting some sorta move on Jenny. "Better than it was in high school." He added, only realizing after that Jenny would have no idea what High School was. Did aliens have High School? Hell, did the British?

"Can you tell me about it?" She asked him earnestly, snapping him out of his slight daze.

Tim hesitated. Reliving high school, even post John Smith, was not something he wanted to do. Clearing his throat, he shifted to look at the blonde sitting next to him. "Well, umm, in University you get to learn shit. Stuff. Learn stuff. Stuff that you're, uh, I dunno, actually interested in. Like me, I decided I wanted to be what they call an English major, cause I'm more more into words and sh-stuff than all that science and math crap." When Jenny just looked more confused, he laughed. "Look you go to school, you learn stuff. What ever stuff you want or is available. Your Dad seems to think anything you'd learn from a place like I go to would be utterly useless to you, so I don't know what to say."

"Do you enjoy it though?" Jenny asked, chewing her lip and glancing over toward her parents and Donna who all clutched mugs of tea and wore serious expressions. He caught the words 'illegal' and 'arrested' from the red head, and the Doctor scoffing, but not much more. "If you could travel or learn, what would you choose?" Jenny asked him after a second.

"Travel." He said without hesitation. "I made the mistake of not."

"But what if you feel like the traveling just isn't enough?" Jenny asked him honestly.

Tim gapped at her, honestly unsure how to answer that. "Umm…." He said, and wasn't that just the most intelligent sound answer he could think of? Not like it really mattered what Jenny thought of him, but if he was in what Time Lords considered kindergarten, well, he wanted sound smarter than that. If nothing more than to prove a point.

"I was born a soldier," Jenny seemed to want to explain. "All I knew of the world was war. But Dad started to make me see different. And him, and Mum, and Aunt Donna, they've shown me some great things and places, and it's amazing, and I love the travel but sometimes I feel like it's not enough. We never get to stay long enough for me to really take it all in the way I want to." She chuckled. "But who am I kidding? The running's fun, ain't it?"

To that, Tim could smile. Because he had so little experience with it, but damn weren't those months spent with Wolf Girl some of the best despite the danger. And he recalled more times than he could count how he stood on a whole other planet once upon a time. "Yeah." He said, "It's fucking awesome."

"Alright." The Doctor whined, and Tim and Jenny turned to the supposedly more mature people in the apartment only to see the Doctor pouting, and Donna looking like a smug child who got her way. "Fine. But if we have to do something so domestic as a dinner out as a family it's going to be quick."

"Oh, shove off, Spaceman, you've been having family dinners for a while now."

"Yes, well," he sniffed, straightening his already straight tie. "On the TARDIS is one thing. It's an efficient means for all parties on board to get the nutrients and energy needed. This, this is just … just."

"Doctor, it'll be fine." Rose smiled, gripping his shoulder. She then turned to them. "Come on you two."

"What, me too?" Tim asked, taken aback.

"Yes, you too. Wouldn't do for my little brother to stay at home, would it?" She asked teasingly, tongue in the corner of her mouth as she smiled.

"Guess not." Tim said, getting up off the couch at the same time Jenny did.

They joined the others, and Tim grabbed his keys off the counter.

"Also, we're gong to be engaging into some criminal activity tonight," Rose added as they opened the door. "Might be the last chance you have for a decent meal."

* * *

 

"Breaking and entering to check out a lab. Just another night, I suppose." Donna had said as the Doctor soniced the lock on the main doors until it popped open. He then stuck his arm within as if feeling around for something.

"Of course," Rose said to Donna in a whisper just loud enough to be heard over the whirring of the sonic. A few seconds later sparks erupted with a snap, and the Doctor beamed. "All set, then, are we?" Rose asked him with a tongue touched grin as he beamed like an idiot back at her.

"That we are, Shake." He said as he pushed the door open a little further. He stepped in first, and Rose followed right behind, glancing behind the make sure Donna, her Daughter, and Tim where as well.

"We should probably split up, yeah?" She said to him in a hushed voice. "You can scan the video feed."

"And you'll…." He said, taking her hand before she had a chance to say what she had in mind. She knew he saw it in her mind simply by the way his brow knitted. "If you go after her…." He started to say, but Rose lifted her free hand to silence him. His thoughts were clear, and while he had firmly said early he didn't want her to jump off the roof in an attempt to get the girl in red's intentions he was still worried she might try.

"I promise I won't put myself in a position where she could try and use the potion on me." She replied, sending him reassurance through there touch.

"Take Tim with you, and Jenny." He said as if he still wasn't sure she wouldn't attempt it.

"No, not Jenny." She said, to which her daughter whimpered. She smiled at the hurt looking Jenny, her big brown eyes looking exactly like her father's when he didn't get his way. "Sorry, Love, but I think it's best you stay with your Dad on this one. If we do come across the girl, I need to know you'll be alright."

"But I was born a soldier, I can handle myself." She replied firmly, a bit of protest and tantrum in her voice.

"Wolf Girl's right, Goldie Locks." Tim said from just behind her. "Best you stay with Dad this time."

"And exactly who are you to me to tell me what to do?" Jenny snapped, and then as an after thought, added, "And don't call me Goldie Locks."

Tim snorted. "I'm nobody to you." He said, arms out to the side before flopping with a slap against his thighs. "But I do know shit, and I think it's best you stay behind this go."

The Doctor narrowed his gaze at Tim, and Rose watched as the young man looked imploringly back at him. A silence exchange was made by stare down with slight variations of facial expressions before the Doctor nodded once. "He's right. Best you stay with me and Aunt Donna."

With a grumbling protest, Jenny folded her arms and moved to stand by her Dad though she wouldn't look at any of them.

"Be safe." The Doctor said to them.

"You too." She replied, stepping up to him and giving him a quick kiss before turning away and heading down the corridor toward the stairs leading up the labs, the Doctor, Donna, and Jenny heading toward security. A few seconds of silence passed before she looked over at Tim. "Goldie Locks?"

"First thing that popped into my head. Had she been wearing red, well, it would have been too easy." He replied with a smirk.

She smiled, taking him in not for the first time since reuniting. "You look different."

He snorted. "Seeing as how the last time you and I spent any significant amount of time together it was during a pretty strict dictatorship I'd say that's not surprising."

"No, but it's more than that." She said. "You look, I dunno, tired. Healthy, content, but tired."

"I am," He nodded, looking up to the ceiling. "Life without you guys is … I dunno." He sighed. "I know it's only been a year, but before I knew what was coming. I knew you'd be back, I knew in my gut that I'd see you again even if it was during the fucking apocalypse. After you guys left the campus I just carried on. I found that girl I met that night before you left, started dating her since she goes to school here. She makes my brain hurt because she's got the personality of a hamster. I go to class and pretend I give shit about this stuff so I can go on and teach it to other people who pretend to give a shit, and all the while I'm just … bored. I'm wearing a mask of normalcy. I'm better at not letting the shit I know slip out, better and pretending that year never happened, but I'm so fucking tired of it."

"Been five years for us," Rose admitted, making Tim stop short. "After you said you wanted to stay for the time being, our friend Jack went back to his old life too. But that's one thing I could never do, go back to before. Flood gates opened."

"You became feral." Tim nodded slowly. "I saw that coming."

"You didn't say." She said without anger, merely resignation.

Tim nodded. "It was gonna happen during a time that, well, didn't exist at the time. I wasn't sure if I was dreaming because of what I'd see you do, or if I was having a vision. Guess we know now."

"I killed people, Tim."

"I know," He nodded. "I've seen it."

"Other than what you've seen." She retorted.

He chuckled mirthlessly. "Yeah, figured."

"There was no avoiding it, was there?" She asked him, and he shook his head. "So is that why you didn't want to come with us? Were you scared of me?"

He met her eye, held it fiercely. "Never." He said firmly. "I was scared shitless of a lot of things: the family, the Toclafane, the Master, but never you. You could turn into an actual fucking feral wolf right here in front of me and I'd just scratch behind your ears. You love strongly, fiercely, and you have the power to protect what you love, so why should I be scared when you let that devotion take over? I didn't come with you because I was a coward. I wasn't sure I could handle the adventure anymore. Looking back, I should have just told you two to lead the way."

"Best that you didn't, though." Rose said. "I think we all needed this time."

Tim opened his mouth to say something, stopped by the sound of something falling down the stairs.

Rose spun toward them as he did, seeing a girl standing on the landing gaping at them, dressed in a red dress and veil. She looked to the step where the thing had landed, then up at Rose.

Both moved at once.

The girl grabbed the thing she dropped, and Rose started running after her.

It didn't take Rose long to snatch a fist full of red dress, and she knocked the girl to the ground, pinning her down. She looked young but had ancient eyes that reminded Rose a lot of the Doctor. She smiled wickedly, as if she was the one who'd somehow one their little game of chess.

"Who are you?" Rose asked.

"There are Time Lords here." The girl replied, chuckling gleefully. "I sensed one earlier. A young one, so young. I need a Time Lord. I need to know I got it perfect."

"Got what perfect?" Tim asked sternly from somewhere over Rose's shoulder.

"You don't need to know anything, you worthless human." The girl said as if she thought Tim nothing more than a fly on the wall.

"But I do," Rose said, digging her weight more heavily into the girl in front of her. "So tell me."

The girl just smiled. "No," She said before disappearing from beneath Rose in a blur of white light.

There was little shock when her knees made contact with the floor, and her palms hit cool tile. Rose looked up at Tim who stared at the spot wide eyed, his sight unfocused, his breathing ragged. "Tim?" Rose asked, but he didn't look up right away.

"Rose?" The Doctor called from a floor below, and Rose noted she only heard two sets of footsteps coming up behind her. She turned hesitantly, her heart already dropping into her stomach before she even noted it was Donna who was coming with him.

"Where's Jenny?" She asked immediately.

"Back in the office, why?" He asked.

"No she's not." Tim said, looking between Rose and the Doctor. "She's gone. So's the red woman, and if we don't find her soon then something bad is going to happen to her."

Rose was on her feet and darting up the stairs almost as quickly as the Doctor started to move. They ran as quick as they could up to the lab that they'd visited earlier in the day, the door closed again. Quick work of the sonic changed that, and a beat later they were inside.

Hands joined together, gripping one another tightly and sharing the fear and anger each had the moment they stepped inside.

Everything was gone. The basket of vials, the set up tucked away on the table, any trace that anyone was in there at all.

One quick shared thought had Rose and the Doctor running out of the room, passing by a surprised Donna and increasingly worried Tim as they bolted back down the stairs and ran for the office where the Doctor, Donna, and Jenny had been watching the security feed. He threw the door to the reception area open, bolted into the office, and Rose sensed both his hearts dropping the moment her singular heart had.

Tim was right, Jenny was gone.

* * *

 

Jenny was somewhere between bored and overwhelmed, and she wasn't sure which one would have been better. Overwhelmed, because of all the places she'd gone and planets she'd seen she'd never been thrown into a scenario quite like this. The most daring thing she'd encountered before was something her Mum called a roller coaster one a planet her Dad said was made for entertainment. Bored, because while she understood something going on here was completely and totally wrong, the method in which they were going about making it right was dull. It would have been easier, she knew, to simply wait out in the lab and tackle the person when they came in. Or stage a trap, or flash a gun, but her Dad would never do any of that and she knew it. He and Aunt Donna watched the monitor, both going on about this angle and that, pointing and chattering and throwing the odd loving insult each others way. Jenny was used to that, she wasn't used to being forced to spin from side to side on a chair she was sure would be more fun to ride down the empty corridor outside the office.

"She's teleporting inside." The Doctor had said after a while. "It's why we can't see anything. See those flashes? That's her moving about."

"Teleporting," Donna said as if she wasn't sure she could believe it. "From where?"

"I dunno. Likely short range, TARDIS would have picked something up when we landed if there was something like that going on." The Doctor said, sounding more like he was talking more to himself. "Which means she's somewhere on the school grounds. And that makes sense considering all the patients were from here."

"Doctor," Donna said slowly. "What's going to happen to them? If they were given this Elixir, this thing of life, are they going to, you know, be like Rose."

"No," He said firmly. "The Elixir only extended the lives of that of the sisterhood, it wouldn't turn a human immortal. I think. No, definitely not."

"Why couldn't I have gone with Mum and Tim?" Jenny asked after a brief lull of silence, rolling her head to see that only Donna looked at her. She smiled sympathetically, and Jenny both hated and loved it at once.

"Because I suspect your mother and Tim needed a moment the two of them." Her Dad replied distractedly, switching feeds on the monitor. He turned his head, and as he did a face filled the screen, the man's mouth moving as if he was shouting the Doctor's name. "They haven't seen each other in a while, and they went through a lot together." The Doctor continued as the man on the screen seemed to notice Jenny staring at him. He frowned as Jenny narrowed her gaze at him before her eyes widen in recognition.

"Uncle Mickey." She said, and the man on the screen seemed more confused. Just before her Dad and Aunt Donna turned to see what she had been staring at, the man disappeared.

"Sorry?" The Doctor said, looking back at Jenny.

"Nothing," she said, shaking her head.

He didn't look convinced, but let it go. "Anyway, the two haven't had a moment, I imagine this if their way of having it."

"Doctor," Donna said, slapping his arm and then pointing to the monitor. "That's the live feed, she's here."

"Oh, brilliant," he said. "Allons-y Donna, Jenny. Let's go get our lady in red before she disappears on us again."

"I'll wait here." Jenny said, glancing at the monitor.

The Doctor hesitated, but nodded, and he and Donna darted out through what they had called the reception area then out into the hall. Once they had gone she moved into her Dad's seat, a part of her finding it painfully comforting like being wrapped in a warm blanket. She'd found that with both her parents, that she enjoyed occupying the spaces they had. She hailed her mother's old quilt from the pink room marked with a rose on the door down to her own because it smelled just like both her parents. Jenny liked wearing her mother's old clothes because it helped her feel closer to her, and in the library there was one particular spot that just felt like safety and home.

And the part of her that was a child of the machine hated that she enjoyed it so much.

Focusing on the monitor instead of the childish enjoyment she got from her Dad's lingering presence, she stared and hoped for the man she thought looked a lot like Uncle Mickey to come back. It was odd, because for the time he was on the screen it seemed brighter, more colorful than the rest of the monitor feeds, and she didn't understand why. And she wanted to, badly.

A flash of light flickered against one of the screens, and she hoped beyond hope that it was a sign that he was about to appear.

"Time Lord." She heard a woman say behind her before a sharp pain shot through the back of her head, and she saw nothing else.

* * *

 

"Short range, has to be short range," The Doctor partly growled as he paced in a small circle, pulling at his hair and gritting his teeth. "I could use the sonic, lock on to Jenny's biometric signature and track her down."

"Are you sure she's not in the building." Donna asked as gently as she could, defeat and pain echoing in her soul as she watched the Doctor go slightly mad and Rose stare off darkly into the distance. She hadn't said much since their daughter couldn't be found in the security office or anywhere in the near vicinity, and for the first time in their travels Donna could see how dangerous the woman she called friend could truly be. There was something wild in Rose's eyes, something that made Donna want to keep her distance while simultaneously thankful they were on the same side.

"She's gone," Tim said without doubt.

"Think, Tim, what did you see?" The Doctor said, coming up to the young man with three large steps and gripped his shoulders. His brown eyes peered into Tim's blue as if he could see what the boy envisioned by staring into them.

He closed his eyes, likely to focus better, and took a deep breath. "She's in a room, on a table. Strapped down, I think. It's plain. There's a window, it's night. I see the girl in red, she's there, she's alone, and she's smiling right crazy like. And there's …." He stopped, visibly swallowing.

"What, Tim? There's what?" The Doctor asked desperately.

The poor kid looked torn, like he didn't want to say something. Then his jaw went slack and his eyes popped open. "I know where she is."

"Where?" The Doctor growled.

"The ward. She's in the ward."

Rose ran for the door, and a beat later Donna was following the Doctor and Tim as they chased after her.

They caught up with her at Tim's car, throwing open the driver's door.

"Let me drive, Wolf Girl. I know a quicker route."Tim said as gently as the urgency allowed.

Rose looked like she was ready to growl at him, but moved to the back throwing the door open roughly and climbing in roughly. Donna hopped in the front with Tim, noting only to herself how odd it felt to be sitting in the front right seat and not be driving. He turned the key and had the car speeding out the of the University parking lot before he fully had his seat belt on.

"Speeding." Donna noted.

"We've got a dying relative in the hospital and we're racing to say goodbye. Might be surprised what that excuse will get you out of." He said absentmindedly as he took a sharp left.

"Let's not make that a fact." The Doctor snarled.

"She's a Time Lord, she'll just change, won't she?" Tim asked, glancing to Donna and then into the rear view mirror.

"We don't know how Time Lord." The Doctor replied, and Donna turned to see how the weight in his voice affected his demeanor. His shoulders sagged, his eyes were glossy, but that strength of the storm hadn't left.

They all stayed quiet after that, and the hospital came into view a moment later.

Tim pulled up to patient drop off. "Go, I'll be up when I can." He said simply, and Donna followed Rose and the Doctor out of the car.

Being so late at night meant they didn't encounter all that many people. They got on to the elevator behind a pregnant woman and her husband who was telling her to breath.

"What floor." The Doctor asked kindly with a smile.

"Fourth." The husband said as his wife groaned in pain.

The Doctor nodded, pressing the button and making no move to hit the fifth.

"Good luck," Donna said, bending her head to smile at the woman in labor. She smiled back weakly but said nothing before another contraction took hold.

The doors opened, the couple departed, and the Doctor held the fifth floor button and pulled his sonic out, shining the blue light on it until the elevator started to move. He left it out, his face returning to the stony storm of before as he looked at the floor indicator above. It was only a few seconds before the doors chimed open, and he and Rose clamored out practically on top of each other.

Donna wasn't sure either of them noticed the nurse, Leanne she vaguely recalled, laying on the floor behind the desk. She darted over, check to see she was still breathing, and sighed with relief that she was. Standing up, she looked around, noting that she didn't see anyone, including the patients from before. Maybe they were still sleeping. Had to be. Only way that none of them would have gotten up to investigate what was going on. Surely there had to have been some kind of ruckess when they came in.

Donna moved about, peeking in the room, thankful to see everyone but that girl, Lia, was asleep. The young girl looked to Donna with terror in her eyes.

"She's here." She said, barely loud enough to hear. "I didn't remember, but she appeared by the desk. She hurt Leanne. I … I was too scared.

"Lia, the girl in red, did she have anyone with her?" Lia nodded. "A blonde girl about your age? The one who was with us before?" Lia nodded again. "Which way did they go, sweetheart?" Lia pointed behind Donna, and she turned to see a darkened hallway lined with carts of medical supplies and portable monitors. "Thank you." She said, stepping out of Lia's doorway as the Doctor and Rose came around the corner from the other side. "She's down here." Donna indicated, and the couple took off before she had a chance to move.

The scream that cut through the heavy silence made Donna's heart shoot into her throat and tears sting her eyes, the pain in that sweet voice cutting through her and making her stop while it spurred the couple on in a desperate attempt to get to their daughter.

* * *

 

Jenny woke up to the smell of something familiar and awful. The word sterile came to mind, and she opened her eyes to see a white ceiling over her head. She attempted to sit up and found she couldn't as restraints held her down at the wrists and ankles. She struggled, glancing around, recognizing the place but not sure why.

"Don't," A woman's voice said, and Jenny watched as the woman in red stepped into her view. "I want to make sure I have this right, and I can't be sure if you're hurt."

"What are you doing?" Jenny asked as the woman opened a small room. She thought she glimpsed a loo, but the most obvious thing she'd seen was the funny looking contraption from the school laboratory just inside.

The woman in red pulled out the basket of vial things that Jenny remembered Tim playing with, taking it and sitting it on a table on wheels. She methodically began to pull a stopper out of a vial and pour the contents in a yellow, plastic cup.

"I was part of a great cult once. One that the Time Lords worshiped for our abilities. Or, at least they should have. Your people can regenerate, our people had no need for such things."

"I'm not a Time Lord." Jenny tried to lie, hoping that what ever this crazy woman had planned would change with the knowledge.

She smiled. "Not entirely, no. Shame, really. But you're close enough, I suspect, that if I got this right then the affect will be the same. How long have you been in that particular body? Not very fond of it, are you?" Jenny swallowed back the bile that rose at the woman's sinister grin while she continued dumping liquid inside the cup. "I'm sure they'll let me back if I prove to them that they don't need some supposedly sacred flame to make their precious elixir."

"Who?" Jenny choked out.

"The Sisterhood." The woman said simply, looking at Jenny as if this was common knowledge. "Surely they still tell you all about that on Gallifrey?" Jenny's heart raced at the mention of her father's home planet, knowing full well what happened to it. Part of her history lessons in the first couple weeks with her parents on the TARDIS. "Doesn't matter. Because if this works, you can tell your people that there are ways the elixir can be made outside of Karn."

With eight empty vials resting on the table top, the woman in red picked up the cup with a smile that wasn't at all comforting. She grabbed Jenny's face in such a way that her mouth was forced open against her will. "I would swallow, if I were you. Because I've seen some interestingly barbaric contraptions around this place that will allow me to force you to ingest this. And seeing as how I only have enough reserved for another dose, you can imagine it won't take me long to get one of those tubes and shove it down your throat." Without another warning, the woman began to pour the liquid into Jenny's mouth.

Instinct made her struggle and choke on the oddly smoky tasting liquid. It filled her nose, made her want to gasp for air, but somehow she managed to swallow some of it.

The woman dropped the cup on the floor, backing away and watching Jenny with fierce intention.

The burning started in her stomach, quickly spreading as if her veins and muscles were lit on fire. Maybe they were, as the heat burned intensely while her whole body began to glow. A scream escaped from her throat that she had no control over.

"Daddy!" She screamed out in pain, tears spilling hotly from her eyes. "Daddy, help me."

"Jenny," She heard his voice, but couldn't see him through the blinding light.

The next thing Jenny heard was the feral scream of her mother, and a sickening thud against something.

* * *

 

"What have you done to my daughter?" Rose demanded as her hand wrapped tightly around the woman in red's throat. She had worried for a moment that maybe she had killed the woman when she slammed her hard against the wall and her skull audibly cracked on contact, the plaster of the wall doing the same. But the woman simply grinned.

"It's working." She hissed before Rose tightened her grip.

"What did you do to her? Answer me or I swear I will kill you right here."

"And I'll let her." The Doctor said, and Rose didn't even have to turn to see how present the Oncoming Storm was in that moment.

The woman laughed. "You wouldn't. Time Lords hate to interfere. More so, you lot  _need_  us, or at least you did until I came along. Now I can teach you how to make the elixir yourself. Any regeneration gone wrong and it's a simple fix, no need to go begging Ohila and the others for help."

The Doctor scoffed. "Wouldn't have been a bad idea if there were any other Time Lords left." He said, a calm to his voice that made Rose flinch.

"How is Jenny?" She asked.

"Alive." The Doctor said easily, "Passed out, but both hearts still beating."

"You can't be last of the Time Lords." The woman said firmly. "There's only one person who might have survived the end of the war, so it's obviously still raging."

The Doctor stepped up beside Rose. "And who was that one person, hmm?" He asked the woman who looked at him with suspicion. "The Destroyer of Worlds, the Bringer of Darkness, the Oncoming Storm. How many other names do I have, sister? What is it? Sister what?"

Rose felt the woman swallow beneath her hand and her pulse quicken. "Gridin." She choked out.

"Sister Gridin. Can't say I ever heard of you, but you've certainly heard of me."

She shook her head as much as she could. "No, you can't be. You can't be him. It's not possible."

"I can see how you'd think that. This body makes people have a hard time seeing me as a threat. It's a curse, really. Nobody ever questioned what kind of man I was in my last body, fresh from the war, fresh from watching Gallifrey burn. The effects of that act rippled across the Universe, it devastated whole races, and that includes, I'm afraid, the sisterhood. Karn was destroyed along with nearly every other planet in Kasterborous. So here we are, the two of us, last of our kind. Question is, how did you get here?" He asked, and the Gridin didn't answer. "You teleported out, used the sacred flame."

"It's just fire." She spat.

"You worship that flame." He challenged. "But I suppose you're right. What made the flame special is that it heated the rocks that the water passed over. You found the right minerals somehow, used it to duplicate the elixir."

"And it works." She said. "Look at that Time Lord. She's alive, she's …" She stopped as she really looked at her. "She's unchanged."

Rose whipped her head around to see Jenny looking exactly the same, Donna stroking her hair and sitting on the edge of the bed beside her.

"She didn't regenerate." Rose said softly, glancing at Tim as he appeared panting in the doorway.

"Oh she did." The Doctor said, and Rose looked to see that the storm still raging in his eyes despite the calm of his voice. "But Jenny is an anomaly, she may never regenerate the way I do."

"So the elixir works?" Gridin said, eyes filled with hope as they darted between the Doctor and Jenny. "Truly works. I can share my knowledge. My elixir."

"Oh, you mean these things?" Tim's voice came from behind, and Rose turned to see him picking up the small box. The vials rolled around as he tilted it about. "You mean the things that made Jenny, and Lia, and the others suffer through an unimaginable pain?" He then tilted the box while looking Gridin straight in the eye. The vials tumbled to the floor, shattering one by one, and when the last one seemed to make it through the fall Tim lifted his foot and stomped on it. "My bad." He said.

"I can make more." Gridin said.

"No you won't." The Doctor said. Gridin looked at him, confused. "I'll be taking you to the Shadow Proclamation for crimes against a level five planet."

"You can try, but I'll just teleport out." She countered.

"You may claim there was nothing special about the flame but I bet you took a little bit with you when you first left Karn, didn't you? I imagine you were scared, escaped the Time War by teleporting out but not before finding someway to take the flame with you." He said, and Rose could see but the way her eyes glistened hit a nerve. It's what you were using to teleport here on Earth short range. A small remnant of the flame. Funny thing about fire, it needs something to burn for it to stay alive. You kept it going all this time, however long you were stuck here. But in your eagerness to get my daughter out of my reach, to experiment on her, you forgot to do one thing." He said, gesturing to the side of the room. "You forgot you needed a way to keep the fire burning."

Rose felt her twitch beneath her hand before Gridin looked over to where the Doctor gestured. Rose turned her head, following their gaze, and notice a tiny lantern sitting on the window ledge, the wick burned to the end.

"There's no Karn to take you back to," He reminded Gridin. "You let the last bit of your planet die."

"So why don't you just let your little animal here snap my neck and finish me?" She asked.

Rose loosened her grip on Gridin's neck. "Jenny lived." She said. "Means you get to, too."

"Dad?" Jenny's voice came from behind her. "Mum?" Rose turned, seeing their daughter slowly sitting up. Donna was quickly removing the restraints on her wrists before helping her upright.

Without a second thought, Rose let got of Gridin and ran to her daughter's side, the Doctor crawling on to the other side of the bed. Both held her, whispered reassurances, and Rose did her best to keep herself from crying with relief, the tension in her body relaxing in the presence of her daughter.

"I don't mean to interrupt, but exactly how are we going to get her to the TARDIS?" Tim asked as Gridin stood still as if she was still being pinned to the wall.

"She'll come willingly." The Doctor said without any doubt. "Won't you Gridin?"

She didn't say anything, her eyes drifting down to the floor where it was likely the liquid of the elixir remained in a puddle. She didn't flinch, she barely looked like she was breathing, and as Rose clutched her daughter she started to feel a little bad for Gridin's sudden loses. Her work, her home, her only connection to it: all gone.

* * *

 

At Tim's flat, Jenny remained glued to her mother's side on his couch as he told them stories of what happened over the last year. Rose smiled, realizing how much she was going to miss him when they left. He was animatedly telling tells of night out gone crazy when the grinding sounds of the TARDIS filled the living room.

Materializing in front of the balcony door, the TARDIS began to fully form, sending gusts of wind over the four in the room.

"Blimey," Donna said, "Question his driving, but that's more impressive than a parallel park."

"Remind me to tell you about the Olympics." Rose said over her daughter's head to the ginger on the other end who grinned back slyly.

"Well then," The Doctor said, popping his head out of the TARDIS with a manic grin. "Gridin is now in the hands of the Shadow Proclamation. Low levels, of course, she's not any real danger now that she can't produce the elixir. For some reason they all seemed quite busy, lots of running about but hardly anyone blinking at a Karn sister bringing people back from the dead on Earth."

"And the Shadow Proclamation is, like, what, Space police?" Tim said as he sat on the edge of his bed, moving his foot in a silent tap.

"Yeah," The Doctor said. "So, crisis averted. Peeked in at the hospital, all the patients in the ward are recovering but it might be a while before anyone feels right around them. Gonna be like me around Jack, I think."

"So this is it," Tim said, standing up and putting his hands in his jean pockets. "You guys are leaving."

The room was silent, and Rose looked to the Doctor who met her eye across the room. The corner of his mouth turned up slightly, and he glanced over at Donna. Rose did too, her heart picking up speed as she saw the grin on her friend's face.

"Yep." She said to Tim. "Gonna come with us? Sure Spaceman and Wolf Girl won't mind it so long as you keep your hands off Jenny."

Tim's jaw dropped, his mouth stretching into a grin as he whipped his head around to look at the Doctor again. His mouth moved around, but no words came out.

"You'd be joining a pretty limited club if you did," The Doctor grinned wider. "Never asked anyone but Rose to come with me twice, and Donna was a second chance. I know it's technically your third chance, but…"

"Fuck. Yes." He said eagerly. Tim jumped up whooping for joy before darting to his closet. He pulled out a duffel bag, throwing it over his shoulder as he closed the door and dug out his cell. He dialed, stopping in the middle of the room. "Aunt Lorraine? It's me. Listen, I'm going to be away for a bit. Might be back tomorrow, might be back ten years from now, I dunno. Just trust me when I say that I'm safe. And if, for what ever reason, you don't hear from me again, I just wanna say thank you for putting up with me, and I love ya." He chuckled. "Later." He said before he hung up, sticking his phone in his pocket. "Let's do this."

"Allons-y," The Doctor said with a grin and a shake of his head, opening the door and stepping aside for the rest of them to come aboard.

As Rose stepped inside, she was hit with the excited hum of the TARDIS. The Old Girl seemed to sing a happy song as Tim stepped on board, moving up the ramp and caressing the edge of the console.

"Is she as happy to have me on board as I think she is?" He asked, looking back at the Doctor and Rose as Donna walked past them.

"That she is," The Doctor replied putting his arm around Rose. "I don't remember the last time the old girl had this many people on board. So many of us traveling together, going to make things interesting."

"Umm, Mum, Dad," Jenny said slowly, and Rose turned to see her daughter nervously pulling at the sleeves of her jacket. "Can we talk?"

"Sure," The Doctor said, the and Rose picked up on the worried hitch in his voice. "Just let me send us into the vortex alright?" He said, giving Rose's arm a quick rub before he darted up the ramp and dance around the console. Jenny took Rose's hand, and the two moved up to the top as the TARDIS engines ground out.

She met Donna's eye, and the ginger woman nodded from her place on the jumpseat.

"Tim," She said as she stood up. "Let's leave these guys to talk while I help you find a room." Donna came around and put her arm around Tim's shoulders.

"I can't believe I'm doing this." He said as they headed for the corridor.

"Join the club, Mate." She said just before the disappeared.

Jenny let go of Rose's hand and headed for the jump seat, sitting down and looking at her knees, fidgeting with her skirt.

"Jenny?" The Doctor said, trying to get her attention as he stood in front of her. When she didn't say anything he leaned back on the console, crossing his arms and one leg over the other. "What's going on?"

"That was so painful." She finally said, making Rose inhale sharply. "What was that?"

"A forced regeneration." The Doctor said bitterly before he moved and sat down next to Jenny. He put his hand on her back, running it up and down soothingly. "It's not right that Grindin did that, and it should never have happened. It won't happen again, so long as you stay out of trouble. At least, not for a very long time and not … not until it's supposed to happen."

Jenny turned and looked her father in the eye. "I'm a soldier, it's how I was made, but today I was … I was not ready to die. It didn't feel like it was going to be an honor. I was scared, and I shouldn't be because I wasn't made to be scared of death."

"No," he shook his head. "No, Love, you were not made that way. But you have my TNA and let me tell you something, I am  _so_  afraid of dying. Even knowing I'll come back I'm terrified. Time Lords, normally we change so much about ourselves that it's like a new man, a new person takes our place. We don't look the same, sound the same, like the same things, and it's terrifying. And your mother," he snorted. "Oh she can't die and yet she's still scared of it."

Jenny looked up, met her eye, and Rose swallowed back the pain in her chest. "'S true." She said. "I'll do what ever it takes to protect you and your father but it hurts. It hurts every time and it never gets easier."

"But … but you make it seem like it's no big deal." Jenny tried to reason.

"Because it's easier than admitting how terrifying it is. When it's your father's life on the line I don't think about the consequences. Never have, never will with you either. But sweetheart, it's okay to be scared."

Jenny nodded. "I've been thinking," She said after a beat of quiet. "I'm going to live a long time, yeah? And I love the running, and the traveling, I do, but … is there anyway that I can, I dunno, umm." She wrung her hands, avoiding either Rose or the Doctor's gazes. "I wanna learn. I wanna learn about the Universe, and everything about its history."

"You'll learn with us," Rose said with a smile.

"You want to go to school." The Doctor noted, realization coming over him instantly. Jenny nodded, looking to Rose apologetically.

"Dad said there were schools I could got to if I was interested. I am." She said firmly, though the fear of disappointment was evident. "I'm still thinking like a soldier, but I realized today I don't have the heart of one. I want to … to flood that instinct out. I want to replace all that war knowledge with something else. And the small tastes I've been getting with all the museums, and the historical happenings, it's fantastic. But not enough."

"Sweetheart, it's okay." Rose said as she sat down beside Jenny. "If that's what you want."

"You aren't upset?" She asked, looking between her parents. "You aren't upset that I don't want to travel like this right now?'

"Jenny, we'll know where you'll be. We'll know you'll be safe, and we can see you anytime. How can we possibly be upset with you?" The Doctor asked before placing a kiss on his daughter's temple. "Just give me a bit to get things sorted, and you can go collect what you need."

* * *

 

They stood in the lobby of the University of the Galactic Federation, having just finished the grand tour of the school Jenny Jacqueline Tyler would be attending for the foreseeable future. It was vast, nearly the size of the entire planet that housed it, and the Doctor boasted it being the second best in the Universe, though he preferred it over number one.

"I'm gonna miss you, Sweetheart," Donna said as she hugged Jenny tight, rubbing her back. "But I'll be around to visit when your Mum and Dad do."

"I'll miss you, too Aunt Donna." She replied, and Rose smiled and bit her lip as a single tear fell down Donna's cheek. The ginger quickly wiped it away before Jenny could see it, standing back and fussing with the blonde hair before she stepped back.

Tim stepped up awkwardly. "Good luck," He said with a grin. "Barely know you, but…."

"Aww, come'ere, you." Jenny said, pulling Tim into a hug that caught him off guard and had him awkwardly hanging his arms around her, patting her loosely as he looked to Rose for help. She only laughed.

"Mum," Jenny said as she stepped back, turning her open arms toward her.

Rose stepped into them instantly. "Love you, Sweetheart," She said, squeezing Jenny before giving her a kiss on the head. "I'll see ya soon, yeah?"

"For me, maybe." Jenny said cheekily before she turned toward the Doctor.

Turning away for a moment to give father and daughter a moment just the two of them, Rose's eyes scanned the room and fell on a woman with wildly curly hair staring at her in surprise. Rose gave her a slight grin, and the woman looked like she wanted to say something, to run toward them, but a glance at the Doctor made her physically shift back.

"We're ready to go." The Doctor said, putting his hand on Rose's shoulder and startling her despite speaking first.

"Alright." She said, barely able to pull her eyes away from the curly haired woman. She turned to Jenny and gave her one last hug and kiss on the cheek before letting the Doctor lead her down the marble like stairs and around the corner where the TARDIS was parked. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw the curly haired woman had approached Jenny with a huge, eager smile and a hand extended. She thought she saw her mouth move around a name that began with an 'M' but was too far away to hear or read the woman's lips. A step later and the two girls were out of sight.

"She'll be fine," The Doctor said with an edge of doubt in his voice. "She'll be safe, get a good education."

"Aww, look at you two." Donna teased as she leaned against the time ship, arms crossed. "Seems like only yesterday you were bring your baby girl home from the hostile planet and the machine that created her. Now you're sending her off to University. They grow up so fast."

"That's enough out of you," The Doctor said as he unlocked the door.

"Hey," Donna said gently, putting her hand on the Doctor's arm. "You alright, Spaceman?"

He smiled thinly. "I'm always alright." He replied, looking back at Rose with warmth in his eyes.

"And what about you, Wolf Girl?" Tim asked, dropping his arm around Rose's shoulders as they followed the Doctor inside. "You pretending your alright, too?"

"Yeah," She said, putting her arm around Tim's waist. "She'll be fantastic."

"That she will." The Doctor agreed as he moved to the console and put the ship in the vortex. "Now, I think before we go anywhere or do anything a tour of the ship is order for Mister Latimer, followed by tea in the galley and then a long rest period."

"I could definitely for for that shizzle." Tim said, stiffening before looking up at the time rotor. "Okay, fine, censor me if you must. But anything but that word, alright?" He asked, and the TARDIS seemed to hum a laugh. "This shite is going to take some … hey! Yeah, that's more like it." Rose chuckled, shaking her head and crossing her arms as she watched Tim stroke a coral strut in a very Doctor like manner only to have Donna tease him.

A glow from under the console tried to pull her attention, but she refused to let it. Not right now, not with Jenny gone and Tim on board, and curly haired women who seeming to know her. The last day was already filled with enough weird, she didn't need the stupid appendage adding more to it the mix.


	17. Meanwhile: Across the Void 2

Mickey had been sitting dutifully in front of the monitor hoping for a connection to the other side for the last two days. His shoulder was so close to healed, but all agreed that no more jumps were going to be made until he was fully recovered. Jake blundered the last one enough that they couldn't afford to let slip another chance.

"You need to rest, sweetheart." Jackie said as she came into the room carrying a thermos of tea and a bag of something that smelled decidedly like donuts.

"I am resting," Mickey retorted as he took the bag and set it on the desk beside the monitor. "I could be out there chasing after the TARDIS, but instead I'm stuck here staring at a screen and hoping."

"Well, we've connected, that's all that matters." Jackie tried to reassure but even he could see that she was starting to get nervous.

He unscrewed the thermos with a practiced skill that living with only one usable arm would give a person, carefully pouring the pipping hot tea into the mug beside the bag of donuts. He sealed off the thermos, picked up his mug, and took a tiny sip, careful not to burn his tongue.

"Still thinking of jumping when we find them?" He asked Jackie, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Pete wasn't hovering in the background.

Jackie seemed to do the same thing before replying, "Course I am. I have to, Mick's, she's my daughter. Never got to hug or kiss her goodbye, and someone's got to slap that bloody alien if something's ever happened to her over the last three years."

"Might not have been that long," Mickey reminded her. "Time runs a little faster here, remember?"

"Oi, don't remind me. Feels the same, but knowing I could be a couple years younger had I stayed behind."

"Shush," Mickey said as a picture started blinking on the screen. "Holy Shit, it's the Doctor." He said as he glimpsed the bloody alien's face looking at something off to the side.

"Where's Rose?" Jackie immediately asked. "Who's that ginger woman and where is my Rose!" She yelled, and it was right then that Mickey knew there was likely no audio because there was no way in the Universe the Doctor could have ignored that shrill if there had been.

It didn't stop Mickey from yelling at the screen. "Doctor!" He continued to yell, watching the Doctor and the ginger turn to look at a blonde behind them. For a beat, Mickey's heart picked up speed but then it stopped when he realized the girl in the chair behind them was not Rose. But she noticed him, looked at him like she knew him, and then he read her lips.

 _Uncle Mickey_.

He instantly took a screen shot of the video feed, catching it seconds before it faded off.

"I don't understand," Jackie's voice cracked as Mickey opened a photo program and dropped the screen shot in as fast as he could one handed. "Where's Rose? Why wasn't she with him?"

He didn't say anything as he zoomed in on the girl as much as he could, sending the image to the printer. He pushed the chair across the room, knees colliding with the desk the printer rested on but didn't flinch.

When the image popped out he stared at it, studying it as his heart picked up speed all over again.

"Mickey, what is it?" Jackie said as the door opened behind her.

Mickey glanced up, catching Jake's eye and ignoring the torn look that had been there since he blundered the meeting with Rose.

"Jake, was this the girl you saw at the memorial?" Mickey demanded, showing the image to Jake.

He took it, "No," He said with a firm shake of his head. "I saw Rose, definitely Rose. Though she looks familiar."

"Yeah," Jackie said as she stood up and looked over Jake's shoulder. "She does."

"Holy Shit," Mickey said, gripping the top of his head with his good hand as he tried to not think of what it could mean. That girl was easily nineteen or twenty.

"Michael Smith, what the hell is going on?" Jackie asked, and he looked up into her stern but frightened expression. He went to the computer, entered a few strokes, and brought up one of the only photos he had on him when he crossed dimensions the first time. It was taken from his camera phone, of he, Rose, and the Doctor standing in front of the Stone Rose in the museum he volunteered at. He then brought up the screen shot of the young girl, zooming in just a touch more.

"Look at them, then look at her, and tell you don't see it." He said, hoping that that would actually be the outcome. That he was somehow drawing conclusions that weren't there.

"No." Jackie said, sinking down in the chair. "No, it can't be."

"No way," Jake said with a firm shake of the head. "No, I saw Rose and she was young. She looked about as old as that girl there."

"We jump through time, too." Mickey reminded him. "Who's to say we didn't just get a feed through to the future?"

"But you said you saw a ginger woman," Jake retorted as Jackie clamped her hands over her mouth and stared at the screen. "She's ginger. It's the same woman, isn't it?"

"And who's to say that that night I didn't land in the future? Hmm? Not like I saw Rose or the Doctor that night, just the TARDIS." He reasoned, taking a deep breath. "That girl saw me, looked right at me and said … Uncle Mickey."

"Uncle Mickey?" Jake repeated.

"Yeah."

"You're sure?"

"Can't mistake something like that, Mate."

"That girl. She's … she's my…." Jackie dropped her hands to her lap. "I'm going to slap that alien so bloody hard when I see him again he'll go through two faces. I told him to take care of her, not knock her up with his alien … stuff. What on bloody Earth or any other planet made him think it was alright to do that, huh? Does he think 'cause I'm not there he can do what ever the bloody hell he pleases?"

Mickey watched Jackie rant without the thought to stop her. Because of all the things she could have pressed on, like the likelihood that Rose was about her age now, or the fact that the blonde in the picture was probably her granddaughter, she dwelled on the fact that the Doctor and Rose had ….

Well, now that he thought about, he wasn't sure he liked it much either. Especially considering the outcome.

"Hey guys," Jake pulled Mickey from his thoughts. "You  _sure_  you hit the future? 'Cause that sure looks like Rose there."

Mickey looked at the screen, seeing Rose and the Doctor on the jumpseat of the TARDIS curled into each other and talking. She looked no older than she had the day they closed the rift, and if he wasn't so afraid to pull his eyes away in case they saw him he'd have glanced over at Jackie. Just as it seemed the Doctor was about to kiss Rose he looked up at something off to the side and smile. Just before the image cut out, the ginger appeared beside Rose, glancing over and seeming to spot him before it disappeared.

"That's all kinds of messed up." Jake said.

"But she can't be there and with, with," Jackie just gestured at the restored photo of the girl.

"Look, all of that isn't important right now," Mickey said, taking a deep breath and putting on a level head. "The mission is to find the Doctor and save the Universe. Everything else is secondary if at all existent. Maybe we'll just … keep her in mind, case I jump and run into her instead of the Doctor."

"And we need to hurry." Jake said with a nod. "'Cause it's dark outside, and I only see a couple stars left."


	18. The Unicorn and the Wasp pt 1

"That was …." Rose said with a huge grin, trying to catch her breath. She pushed her hair off her sweaty face, letting her hand flop against the pillow beneath her.

"Bloody brilliant." The Doctor finished with a grin stretching ear to ear, full of himself as he tucked his hands behind his head. "That time was bloody brilliant. See? Just needed to go a few rounds to get it like that again. Just was out of practice from all the … interruptions."

"Do not blame our daughter for the first few times." Rose chided, rolling on to her side and propping her head up. "Sometimes that happens when you've been together as long as we've been."

"Nope. Superior being, me. It was just lack of practice, is all." He replied with a sniff, that smug grin fading.

Rose chuckled, laid her head against his bare chest, the few hairs that covered it tickling her cheek as she listened to the double beat of his hearts.

"What ever you say." She replied with a sigh, reveling in the closeness that they hadn't really had while Jenny was on board.

It had only been a month, but it was keenly felt after so many years just the two of them. Having Donna with them had subdued them enough, but when their daughter joined them it was worse. So after a couple hours in the galley getting reacquainted with Tim and answering any questions he may have had, the four of them went their separate ways and turned in for a rest period.

There just hadn't been quite as much rest taking place in their bed. With no daughter to pound insistently at the door, and Donna seeming to have the good sense to let them be, time escaped the Time Lord, and Rose didn't mind in the least.

"We should, umm, probably get out of bed though." He said, sounding suddenly sheepish. Rose craned her head and looked up at him. "Just sorta, umm, checked, and it seems like we've been here for a couple of, umm, days."

"A couple of days?" Rose sat up, looking down at her lover, her mate, and seeing his cocky grin pairing with the bright red of his ears. "We've been in here for a couple of days? Sleeping, and, and, and …."

"Well, there was a couple times I stepped out to get us a snack, but I didn't see Donna or Tim so I just assumed that we weren't, you know, sequestered quite so long."

Rose laughed, flushed with embarrassment long before she'd encounter the two people she'd be embarrassed in front of, tossed of the blankets. "I'm going to shower."

"I'll join you," The Doctor was on his feet and moving for the bathroom before Rose was fully off the bed.

It was close to another half hour before they finally left the shower, and after getting dressed as quickly as possible the two finally emerged and headed into the galley.

"Oh look who finally came out of hiding." Donna teased instantly, hands wrapped around a mug of tea as she sat on the table and Tim flipped pancakes at the stove. "I know it's normal for parents to sorta celebrate being child free when the kids go off to school, but I think you two just set a record."

"Sorry," The Doctor said, rubbing the back of his neck.

"I'm just glad the TARDIS hid your door. Didn't have to worry about walking by and hearing something I didn't want to." She took a sip. "Though two days, I'm surprised you're still walking." She said to Rose who turned a deep shade of red as Donna tried not to laugh. "And let's not forget that while  _I'm_  understanding of the need, we only just took Tim aboard and he's hasn't gone anywhere yet."

"I'm on a freakin' space ship." Tim said from his place at the stove, eyes on the pancake he'd flicked into the air so he could catch it in the pan. "I don't care if you two go at it for a week, I don't need to go anywhere to have the time of my life. You have a billiards room where I played against myself. Literally, a hologram of myself giving me a run for my money."

"The TARDIS is a magnificent ship, but how about after breakfast we actually take a trip. We could go to Lumera 9 for their wonderful festival of lights. Or the planet Zog, gorgeous place Zog. Blue grass, pink sky, and Rose can get those little fuzzy purple fruit things she loves so much. Personally I go for the orange banana-like things, but that's just me."

"Seriously? An alien planet?" Tim asked as he brought four plates of pancakes over to the table with the skill of a waiter. He set them down at each place setting before plopping down himself.

"Well, to them you're the alien." The Doctor countered as Rose sat down and beside him.

"Fair point." Tim countered, pointing at the Doctor with his fork. "Still, my only previous experience with such things having lasted no more than five minutes, I'm looking forward to this." He broke off a piece of pancake, and was just about to put it in his mouth when he paused. "Question: I don't speak anything other than English and barely passable French. How the frack am I going to communicate with anyone? Is there like a crash course in how to speak Zogonian I gotta take before leave the TARDIS?"

"She translates for you." Donna said as if she'd known this for years, waving it off before reaching for the syrup. "So you can speak your barely passable French and it would still sound to them like Zogonian."

"Sweet." Tim replied before shoving a fork full of pancake in his mouth.

"Actually, they aren't Zogonians, they're Zogalites, but that's neither her nor there." The Doctor waved it off. "Well, it's there, I suppose. But anyway, I'm famished."

"I wonder why," Donna teased.

"Oi, that's enough out of you." The Doctor countered.

"They always like this?" Tim asked Rose.

"Constantly." She replied as Donna and the Doctor continued to tease and annoy one another.

Once breakfast was finished the four of them moved to the console room where Donna sat on the jumpseat, Tim grabbed hold of one of the rails, and the Doctor and Rose piloted the TARDIS.

Just as they were getting ready to land, Rose glanced at the controls and noticed the coordinates had changed. She glanced to the Doctor who hadn't come near them after setting them, and seeing he was too focused on his half of the piloting.

" _Did you do this?"_  Rose asked the ship mentally, looking to the higher parts of the Time Rotor. The TARDIS hummed almost smugly.

"Doctor," Rose said, and he looked up immediately. "Fair warning, our cheeky Time Ship has other plans."

He furrowed his brow as said time ship ground out her landing. After the gentle shudder, the Doctor turned and grabbed his long coat off the rail, came around toward her and took Rose's hand. "Let's see where out Old Girl took us this time, shall we?" He said as they headed toward the ramp. He paused at the doors, turning to see their companions hadn't moved. "You two coming?"

"Hell yeah," Tim said with a wide grin as he pushed himself off the rail and Donna stood up with a chuckle.

The Doctor and Rose waited a moment for the other two to catch up before he opened the door and they stepped out.

Earth. Even if she hadn't noticed the change of location on the control panel, she'd have known by the way the air tasted and how the atmosphere felt.

The Doctor took a deep breath. "Smell that air!" He said excitedly. "Grass and lemonade," He took another sniff. "And a little bit of mint. A hint of mint, must be the 1920s."

"Seriously." Tim said, looking up and around them as he put his hands in his leather jacket pocket. "Like Earth 1920s?"

"Yep," The Doctor said, popping the 'P'.

"You can tell what  _year_  it is just by smelling?" Donna asked incredulously, folding her arms over her chest.

"Oh yes," The Doctor replied cockily.

"He checked the console, didn't he?" Donna asked Rose, smirking and pointedly ignoring the Doctor's affronted look.

"I did, he didn't." Rose replied, also ignoring the Doctor only this time it was because of his overly smug smile and the way he adjusted his tie.

"Dudes, someone's coming." Tim warned, and the four of them moved to be hidden by the bushes as a beautiful vintage car pulled up a driveway. Peeking around with them, she noted two men dressed well approaching the vehicle.

"The Professor's baggage, Richard, step lively." The older man said, gesturing to the car as the young man moved to the boot. "Good afternoon, Professor Peach."

"Hello, Greeves, Old Man." The portly man greeted as he stepped out of the car. He turned to look over his shoulder, watching a young reverend riding up to them on a bicycle. "Ah, Reverend." The Professor said in way of greeting.

"Professor Peach! Beautiful day," The Reverend smiled as he dismounted from the bike.

"Reverend Golightly," Greeves said to the man with a bow of a head. "Lady Eddison requests you make yourselves comfortable in your rooms. Cocktails will be served on the lawn from half past four."

"You go on up," The Professor said to the Reverend. "I have to check on something in the library alone."

"Professor, this is supposed to be a party. All this work will be the death of you." The Reverend said, and the collective headed toward a large, gorgeous estate home with their voices drifting off.

"Never mind Planet Zog, a party in the 1920s, that's more like it." Donna said eagerly.

"Hey, this is my first trip," Tim countered. "Shouldn't I get a say if we stay?" Donna turned a glare at him, and he grinned. "'Cause I say let's crash this shing dig. Wait, is shing dig a thing in this time?"

"You could make it if it's not." Rose teased with a wink, smiling at Tim with her tongue between her teeth as she felt the Doctor's arm snake around her waist.

"Could go," He said thoughtfully. "Problem is, we haven't been invited. Oh, I forgot," He said with a wide grin, reaching into his blazer and pulling out his psychic paper. "Yes we have."

"I'm starting to love that blank piece of paper." Tim said wistfully. "Whoa, wait. Think we might be a little modern for their liking?" He asked, pulling at the waist of his leather jacket and smacking his hands against his jeans.

"Wardrobe." The Doctor said. "Rose and Donna'll show you. Don't take too long, though." He warned, pointing to Rose sternly with a glint in his eye.

"We'll try not to keep you waiting," She replied with an eye roll before turning and heading inside the TARDIS.

* * *

 

"Hey, Wolf Girl," Tim said, getting her attention as she entered the console room and adjusted the pearl barrette in her curled locks. She turned her attention to the young man in a gray, three piece suit with a black oxford underneath, a light blue tie around his neck in a half tangled mess. "Able to help?" he asked, gesturing to the garment around his neck.

She smiled, careful that her tongue between her teeth didn't ruin her deep red lipstick.

"Could do, yeah." She said as she came up and nimbly started tying it. "Where'd you get this one, anyway?" She asked him.

"TARDIS dropped it on my feet. Figured it must have been a safe option. You know, a none Doctor tie."

Rose grinned. "All of his are in our room. Anything in the wardrobe is fair game with the exception of a very specific leather jacket." She replied.

Once she had the knot done, Rose left it for Tim to adjust. "How do you know how to do that? Dad teach you?"

"My Dad died when I was a baby." Rose replied as she took her favorite beige heels and slipped them on to go with her simple, era appropriate blue dress. Donna had insisted she needed the long string of pearls that now scrapped against the grating. "One of my Mum's boyfriends showed me, and I've had a few years of helping the Doctor."

"Well, there you go." He said as he adjusted his jacket. "I never knew my dad, and my Aunt, well, yeah, if she ever dated I never knew about it." He chuckled.

"Alright," Donna said eagerly just as Rose heard a tap on the door. "Let's get the party started, shall we?" Donna moved over the grating with next to now trouble in her shoes, the alien footwear that was made to look classy but could easily be worn to run in serving the ginger well. She opened the TARDIS door and half leaned out. "What do you think? Flapper or slapper?" She asked the Doctor, and Rose and Tim exchanged a grin that made it obvious both of them were trying not to laugh at the tone Donna took.

"Flapper, you look lovely." She heard her mate compliment their friend's choice in black and gold dress. She really did look lovely, and Rose had said as much in the wardrobe, but she supposed in never hurt to hear it from a trusted male friend. "Where's Rose and Tim?"

"We're here," Rose said as Donna stepped aside so she could step out.

The Doctor's grin stretched. "Look at a you," he said appreciatively. "Gorgeous as ever." He took her hand and kissing her knuckles before glancing at Tim as he stepped out. He half chuckled.

"What? Dressing up only for the ladies, is it?" Tim asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Nope, just think that maybe you could have done with a hair cut. But I wouldn't worry too much, sure you'll fit in just fine." The Doctor replied with a cheeky grin.

Tim rolled his eyes, burying his hands in his pockets and shaking his head while trying not to let on how amused he was.

"Speaking of fitting in," Rose said, pulling off a gold band from her thumb and popping the ring she saw in the wardrobe on the Doctor's left ring finger.

He lifted his hand, staring at it with a grimace before flexing his fingers.

"And there we are, Rose." Donna said. "The reason he's been putting off the wedding."

"Time Lords don't wear wedding rings," He half spat, dropping his hand and twirling the ring around his finger as if he meant to wiggle it off.

"Well, humans do, and last I checked you're supposed to be marrying a human." Donna countered.

"And Rose has a ring! Look, see? I gave her one. Five years ago, on a beautiful planet. Our planet. Our breather place." He rambled, seemingly trying his hardest to not to touch the offending piece of jewelry anymore.

It didn't bother Rose. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact he'd likely have to call her his wife in this era, she likely wouldn't have bothered with it. Somehow she knew he wouldn't wear a wedding band in their future, and she was fine with that. But considering the year they were in, the dynamics of their ensemble, fiancee didn't seem to cut it.

"Dude, no offense, but you look like you're about to crawl out of your skin." Tim commented as they started to head off across the lawn toward the party set up. "I'd say the thought of tying the knot is leaving you scared Shiteless."

"Need I remind everyone here that we are beings of time, we will live on for centuries. Five years to us is like, is like, is like an hour for you in the long run. Maybe less. So unless you get married after being engaged for an hour than you can both pipe down on our plans." The Doctor huffed, taking Rose's right hand in his left and begging her through her bond for help in this.

She rolled her eyes up at him and arched a brow. " _Not gonna happen,"_ She told him. " _May be an hour to you, but I'm still ninety percent human. It's been forever to me_."

The Doctor stopped short at that, looking down at her with genuine worry. She stretched up on her toes, placing a kiss lightly on his cheek, wiping off the tiny smudge of lipstick before giving his hand a tug and encouraging him to lead the way.

As they rounded they were closer to the placing of wicker tables and chairs, the pair of buffet tables holding drinks and food, a maid shouted for the staff to come to attention.

"Good afternoon," The Doctor greeted with a wide grin, switching swiftly to have Rose hold the crook of his arm.

"Drinks Sirs? Ma'ams?" The young man who carried in the professor's luggage earlier asked them with a sight bow.

"A sidecar, please." Donna replied.

"A lime and Soda, thank you." The Doctor replied, glancing down to Rose.

"Same," She replied simply.

"Err, umm, what ever's going around?" Tim asked, looking panicked as he glanced between the server and his companions.

The server smirked, giving Tim a quick once over. "I know just the thing." He said, and if Rose had blinked she'd have missed the wink the young man had sent Tim. She looked over her shoulder, but he didn't seem to have noticed or cared. Tim adjusted his tie unnecessarily as he looked around at the large estate.

"May I announce, Lady Clemency Eddison." The older butler from earlier called out, and an older, sharply dressed woman sauntered over with a smile.

The Doctor offered her his hand. "Lady Eddison," He greeted with the utmost politeness.

"Forgive me, but who exactly might you be?" She asked as she glanced around their party.

"I'm the Doctor," He said as if she should remember. "My wife, Rose, her brother Timothy, and Miss Donna Noble of the Chiswick Nobles." He said, pulling out his psychic paper. "We were thrilled to receive your invitation. We met at the Ambassador's reception."

For her sake, Lady Eddison did a marvelous job at acting precisely like she'd remembered them after a flash of the psychic paper. She smiled a little warmer, turned to Rose and reached for her hand to clasp as if she was indeed a dear friend.

"How could I forget you both?" She asked, glancing between the Doctor and Rose. "But one must be sure with the Unicorn on the loose."

"A unicorn? Brilliant! Where?" The Doctor asked, glancing about and bouncing on his feet.

Lady Eddison gave Rose a look silently asking something along the lines of how much the Doctor had had to drink before turning to him once more. " _The_  Unicorn." She clarified. "The jewel thief. And nobody knows who he is. He's just struck again, snatched Lady Babbington's pearls from right under her nose." The lady said as the young man returned with their drinks handing them out.

"Funny place to wear pearls." Rose heard Donna say quietly behind them.

"There are worse places, am I right?" She heard Tim say in the same quiet tone, and the Doctor looked over her shoulder and sent them a glare as if he was chastising Jenny. Rose turned in time to see Donna snicker, and tried her hardest to contain her grin.

When she noticed the Doctor eyeing her in the same way, she rolled her eyes. "Donna's only trying to help Tim adjust." She whispered, and the Doctor glanced back at their newest companion. He didn't say anything else, the older butler having cleared his throat.

"May I announce, the Colonel Hugh Curbishley, the honorable Roger Curbishley."

"My husband and my son," Lady Eddison clarified as the Colonel was pushed toward them, his wheel chair taking Rose by surprise as it looked much more chair like than she was used to.

"Forgive me for not rising." He said in way of greeting. "Never been the same ever since that flu epidemic back in '18."

"Never hold it against you," Rose smiled, extending her hand to the Colonel which seemed to take him by surprise. She swore that maybe she'd caught a slight blush as he grasped her hand lightly.

Roger caught up to where his father was, glanced over Rose quickly, then turned sharply to Donna. "My word, you are a super lady." He said to Donna, taking her hand.

"Oh, I like the cut of your jib, Chin chin." She flirted back.

His eyes shifted, and with it so did his demeanor. Now he seemed more relaxed, and at the same time more apprehensive. He stepped past Donna, hand out to Tim.

"A pleasure, mister …?"

"Tim. Tim Latimer." He introduced himself, shaking Roger's hand.

"Your usual, Sir?" The young man serving drinks came right up to Roger, eyeing him meaningfully. "Ah, thank you, Davenport. Just how I like it." He said in such a way that when Roger finally released Tim's hand, Tim took two wide side steps to rejoin the Doctor and Rose, firmly placing himself at her side.

"Ah, typical. All the decent men are on the other bus." Donna said as she came up beside the Doctor.

"Or married." Rose sighed, and she sensed the Doctor whipping his head around to look at her. She didn't have to be touching his skin to feel the jealousy coming off him, despite it being entirely unfounded, and she tried her best to keep her smile repressed.

"Oi, what are you worried about, Spaceman?" Donna teased. "You aren't in either category, though if it weren't for Rose I may have thought the former."

"He often forgets that there was a time when I was actually looking."

"Not for as long as you've been with me, you haven't." The Doctor said, lifting his chin and adjusting his tie.

Rose shrugged a single shoulder, deciding it best not to comment that she had, in fact, been peeking at least during their first year of travel. He may have had her heart while still in leather, but his hearts seemed unattainable for too long.

"How come she's an Eddison, but her husband and son are Curbishleys?" Donna asked, changing the subject as a fierce looking, petite brunette was introduced as Robina.

"The Eddison title descends through her. One day, Roger will be a lord." The Doctor explained before taking a sip of his drink.

"So how does that work with the different last name?" Tim asked.

"He likely has it incorporated somewhere." The Doctor replied with a shrug. "Perhaps he'll use it, perhaps not."

"Reverend Arnold Golightly." The butler announced, and the young blond man smiled as he glanced around the party guest before greeting Lady Eddison.

"Ah, Reverend. How are you?" She asked sweetly. "I heard about the church last Thursday night. Those ruffians breaking in."

"You apprehended them, I hear." The Colonel said, sounding quite impressed.

"As the Christian Fathers taught me, we must forgive them their trespasses." The reverend smirked. "Quite literally."

"Now, mother, what about this special guest you promised?" Roger asked just as Rose noticed a lovely blonde woman walking toward the crowd.

"Here she is, a lady who needs no introduction." Lady Eddison replied, and the crowd applauded.

While Rose joined in, she could tell that even the Doctor wasn't sure who this woman was. As he shifted closer, she stepped back beside Tim.

"No, no, please, don't." The woman said with genuine embarrassment. "Thank you, Lady Eddison. Honestly, there's no need." She said, having scanned the crowd and noticed the Doctor, and Donna as well, slowly inching toward her. "Agatha Christie." She introduced herself to them, hand extended, and for a moment Rose's heart stuttered for her Doctor. She'd lost count how many times he'd mentioned wanted to meet her over the years.

"What about her?" Donna asked, and Agatha looked startled.

"That's me." She said as if it should have been obvious.

Both Donna and the Doctor's faces fell, twin speechless smiles spreading across their faces.

"No!" Donna dragged it out, causing Agatha to laugh.

"Who?" Tim asked, leaning in to Rose.

"Agatha Christie, famous mystery author." Rose said to him, noting him drawing a blank. "Seriously?"

"Seriously. Name is, I dunno, familiar I guess." Tim shrugged as the Doctor gushed.

"You fool me every time," The Time Lord went on, still grasping poor Agatha's hand. "Well, almost every time. Well, once or twice. Well, once, but it was a good once." He said.

"You two make a rather unusual couple." Agatha said, looking between he and Donna.

"Oh, god, no, not his." Donna said, flashing her hands about. "See, not married."

"May I introduced my wife, Rose Tyler." The Doctor said, reaching behind him and snatching her hand without looking.

"Hello, Ms Christie, it's a pleasure. Truly." Rose said warmly, offering her hand to Agatha who took it with a subtle note of disdain in her smile.

"So young, you must be very newly wed." Agatha said.

"Much older than I look." Rose reassured.

It didn't seem to help. Much.

"Missus Christie, I'm so glad you could come. I'm one of your greatest followers. I've read all six of your books." Lady Eddison cut in before anything more could be said. "Is, ah, Mister Christie not joining us?"

"Is he needed." Agatha replied in a polite snap. "Can't a woman make her own way in the world?"

The Colonel laughed in his chair, breaking up a bit of the cloud of tension. "Now, don't give my wife ideas." He teased.

Agatha, for her part, smiled somewhat genuinely.

As they chattered about her books, ones Rose admittedly hadn't read, the Doctor excused himself from the conversation that Donna seemed lost in, and Tim was zoning out of.

Stepping back beside him again, Rose leaned in and whispered. "Sorry."

"For what?" He asked in a whisper as well.

"First trip out to the past and this is the author you get." Rose said. "One you've barely heard of if at all."

He looked up at her quizzically. "So it's a habit for the first trip to the past to be filled with authors?"

Rose smirked. "Well, Donna had the fall of Pompeii, but mine was Charles Dickens, and Martha's was Shakespeare."

"Oh, you've got to be kidding me." Tim groaned quietly. "Dickens? Shakespeare? That would have been epic. Is he gay? Shakespeare, I mean?"

Rose shrugged, "Seems to like both," She replied as the Doctor rejoined them with a stormy look in his eyes, holding a newspaper in his hands. "What?" She asked him.

"The date on this newspaper," He said, showing his companions.

"What about it?" Donna asked.

"It's the day Agatha Christie disappeared." He said in reply, looking at the author as she smiled and laughed with the rest of the party goers. "She'd just discovered her husband was having an affair."

"Explains why she wasn't so keen on my apparent age." Rose said, and the Doctor furrowed his brow. "Most men go younger when they cheat," Rose explained. "And you look about ten years older than me in Earth years."

"Imagine my last body then." The Doctor said with a grumble.

"You'd never think to look at her, though." Donna said with sympathy. "Smiling away."

"Well, she's British and moneyed. That's what they do, they carry on." He looked back over at Agatha. "Except for this one time. No one knows exactly what happened, she just vanished."

"Maybe it just becomes too much for her." Tim suggested with a shrug. "Maybe she just didn't want to be seen for a bit."

"That wouldn't be a bad theory is it wasn't for the fact that they'll find her car by the side of a lake tomorrow morning. Ten days later, Agatha Christie turns up in a hotel in Harrogate with no memory of how she got there, or what happened. She never spoke about her disappearance until the days she died, but what ever it was …"

"It's about to happen." Donna said.

"Right here, right now." The Doctor nodded.

"Well that makes this interesting." Tim said with a slight pull to the corner of his mouth.

"Professor!" The maid who was present when they first arrived came running from the house, arms flailing in panic. "Professor, the library! Murder! Murder!"

The Doctor took off running, Agatha and Donna immediately following while it took Rose and Tim a moment to move.

"Sounds like we're playing clue." He murmured, and Rose took his hand to pull him along at the pace she was more used to, trying not to smile at Tim's joyful chuckle.

* * *

 

Donna was right behind the Doctor as he and Agatha entered the library. Rose, Tim, and the butler were behind her, which Donna found odd but didn't question too much.

Moving right for the body, the Doctor popped on his glasses as he bent over it.

"Bashed on the head. Blunt instrument." He said matter-of-factly. "Watch broke as he fell. Looks like time of death was quarter past four." He said as he jumped to his feet and moved to the desk, looking over some of the papers.

"Please, please don't tell me that's a pipe there. I don't think I could handle that." Tim said from where he leaned behind the door way with his hands in his trouser pockets.

"That it is," Donna said as she lifted it up. "Professor Peach, in the library, with the lead pipe."

"Except it's Black that gets killed in the game." Tim pointed out, removing a hand from his pocket to literally point at the body in front of them.

"Not the time, you two." Rose chastised as voices started coming down the hall.

Donna had the good sense to glance around, and while the Doctor had a look of appreciation directed at his wife-like-girlfriend, Agatha hadn't seemed to be paying attention while she investigated around the fireplace.

As the party members came in, there was an uproar of various lamentations, all with varying degrees of regret and grief. Somewhere in the clamour, Donna thought she heard Agatha mention calling the police, and she couldn't help but agree that it was an excellent idea.

"You don't have to!" The Doctor said above the noise, bill fold of psychic paper in hand and flashing it around like a policeman would a badge. "Chief inspector Tyler from Scotland Yard. Known as the Doctor. Miss Noble is the plucky young girl who helps me out. Missus Christie was right, go into the sitting room. I will question each of you I turn." He turned to Tim as he stuffed his billfold back inside his pocket. "Tim, could you please keep your sister company for me?" He asked as he strode over and took Rose's hand. The two met each other's eyes in that strange way they did that seemed like they were talking wordlessly to each other. Rose nodded ever so slightly.

"Will do, Doctor." Tim said with a half salute as the Doctor and Rose had their moment. He then turned to Rose with his elbow bent. "Shall we stroll in the gardens, dear sister."

Rose smiled, looping her arm in his, and they left the room.

"We should leave as well." Agatha said to the rest of the party goers. "Leave the room undisturbed."

As Agatha closed the door once the last of the crowd had left, Donna turned tot the Doctor.

"'The plucky young girl who helps me out?'" She put her hands on her hips and glared at him.

"No policewomen in 1926." He clarified as he got down to the ground.

"And you sent Rose away on this?" She asked as she knelt beside him.

"Had to. Already established to this crowd that she's my wife. Would seem odd for me to have her with me all the time."

"So why would a policeman be here with his wife, her brother,  _and_  the 'plucky' woman who helps him?" Donna countered, making the Doctor pause in his examining of something.

He considered this for a long moment. "Huh. Not used to traveling and doing this with so many of you." He said as he brow wrinkled. "I guess, say I was undercover, Rose may have come along so I wouldn't have to say you were my wife. Tim could be a step brother, easily. If Rose and I are thought to be newly wed he may have still been around for the wedding." He beamed as he finished his conclusion.

"Whatever you say, Mister Tyler." Donna teased.

"That's inspector to you, plucky." He teased back before returning his full focus on what ever he found. He pulled a pencil from his pockets, lightly scrapping up some sort of goo on the floor. "Morphic residue." He said with wonder.

"Morphic? Doesn't sound very 1926." Donna noted.

"It's left behind when certain species genetically re-encode." He explained as he looked over the goo on the pencil.

"The murderer is an alien." Donna asked, unsure if she should really be surprised by anything at this point in her adventures with him.

"Which means one of that lot is an alien in human form." He said, shifting his gaze to look at Donna from the corner of his eye.

So not like him, then. Morphic, morph, changing. It's taking on a human form for some reason. Well that's not freakin' wizard or anything. But still, more bizarre was the who they were with under such circumstances.

"There's a murder, a mystery, and Agatha Christie." Donna realized aloud with a bit of wonder.

The Doctor shrugged as he sniffed the goo. "So? Happens to me all the time." He said nonchalantely.

"But isn't that a bit weird? Agatha Christie didn't walk around surrounded by murders. Not really. That's like meeting Charles Dickens, and he's surrounded by ghosts at Christmas." She chuckled.

The Doctor's face took on a dreamy expression. "'I'm so glad I met you.' First time I indirectly told Rose how I felt about her. And, strictly speaking, they were Gelth not ghosts. But close enough."

Donna could only stare at him for a few seconds while she gathered the fragments of her mind. "That  _actually_ happened. Oh come on!" She said, seeing the Doctor chuckle a bit. "It's not like we could drive across country and find Enid Blyton having tea with Noddy … could we?" She said, seeing the light in the Doctor's eyes that she wasn't sure was still lingering there from his memory or if maybe she'd just suggested their next trip. "Noddy's not real, is he? Tell me there's no Noddy."

"There's no Noddy," He reassured, getting to his feet and pocketing the pencil. He reached down a hand to help her to her feet which she took gladly. "But Rose, Martha, and I did meet Shakespeare and battled witches with him." He said with a shrug as he turned to leave the library.

"Next thing you know," Donna said as she and he left the library and headed toward the staircase. "You'll be telling me it's like Murder On the Orient Express, and they all did it."

"Murder of the Orient Express?" Agatha's voice slightly startled Donna made her way down the stairs with the Doctor, surprised to find the author at the bottom as if she'd been waiting for them.

"Oh, yeah, one of your best." She compliments.

"But not yet," The Doctor said quietly through his teeth.

"Marvelous idea though." Agatha mused thoughtfully.

"Yeah, tell you what, copyright Donna Noble, okay?" She said, resisting the urge to nudge Agatha with her elbow.

Anyway!" The Doctor said a touch louder than needed. "Agatha and I will question the suspects. Donna, you search the bedrooms. Look for clues." He said, turning fully toward her and leaning in slightly. "Any more residue." He whispered as he reached into his jacket. "You'll need this," He said in a normal volume as he pulled a magnifying glass out. A touch too large to be taken seriously, and Donna took it with uncertainty.

"Is this for real?" She asked, wondering if he'd have given something like this to Rose.

"Go on," he said cheekily. "You're ever so plucky." Donna rolled her eyes, starting back up the stairs. "Right then, solving a murder mystery with Agatha Christie, brilliant!" She heard him go on behind her.

"How like a man to have fun while there's disaster around him." Donna heard Agatha chastise harshly. "I'll work with you, gladly. But for the sake of justice, not your own amusement."

Donna snickered, wishing Rose had been around to hear the Doctor be put in his place before she rounded the corner on the landing and started her search for goo.


	19. The Unicorn and the Wasp pt 2

"What did he say to you?" Tim asked as they walked out into the yard.

Rose looked up at him, seeing the young man who's arm she held looking back at her patiently.

She smirked, shaking her head. "He's sorry. He knows I like being in the thick of things, and that this is your first trip out and you have to sit on the sidelines. But this could get complicated fast."

"It's fine," he said with a shrug, and Rose craned her head to see his eyes better. "Seriously, Wolf Girl, it's fine. I'm already nervous that my accent, or lack thereof is fracking things up in our cover story. I'm all around nervous about stepping on a bug and screwing up the future or some shite."

Rose chuckled. "Just don't mess in your own time line, and you'll be fine."

"Like you did with your Dad," He nodded, and while Rose knew for certain she'd never spoken of that adventure with Tim, she let it go. Sight things and all. "So how does it work when I don't know half of my parentage?" He asked honestly. "How does it work if I have no idea if the evil dictator we're about to take down isn't the sperm donor that knocked up my Mom?"

"Don't think there were a lot of evil dictators in Canada, let alone the early 90's."

"Clearly you have no idea who was prime minister when I was born." He grinned cheekily, making Rose chuckle. "But no, you have a point. Just, I dunno, kinda hit me when I realized I was eighty years in the past. I mean, I remembered you saying how important it was that we had all your pictures out of your apartment, because you were supposed to be missing. But I just didn't really consider what it would mean if I said the wrong thing, or anything like that."

"I promise you, it's not as complicated as you think it is. Been to the past hundreds of times, even have a statue of myself in a London museum, promise even a mark like that doesn't have much affect. There are paradox risks, but we usually sort that out."

Tim seemed to breathe a literal sigh of relief. "So Dickens and Shakespeare. Any chance we could, I dunno, drop in on Twain at some point?"

Rose chuckled. "Maybe if you're really, really good we can convince the Doctor to bring us to see him sometime. We'll take Jenny, she'd love that."

"Really?" Tim said, sounding genuinely surprised by that. He pouted his lip as he nodded, looking around at the lush gardens and getting Rose to do the same. It was so quiet, peaceful, with only the birds chirping and the bees buzzing for sound.

"I hate bees." Tim said as though thinking out loud. "Hornets are worse, though. Those jerks just sting for the fun of it."

"Does sound like there are a lot of bees though, doesn't it?" Rose noted, looking to Tim and watching as his eyes went wide as a shadow fell over them. "What?"

"Tell me there was something in my drink and I am  _not_  seeing a giant fracking yellow jacket heading toward the manor." He asked with desperation.

Rose whipped her head up and whimpered, tightening her grip on Tim's arm as the two took involuntary steps backward. They watched in terror as a flutter in the window the wasp hovered in front of made it look like a curtain was being drawn back. A moment later the wasp thrust it's lower part out, a stinger large enough that Rose could see it all the way down on the ground, and flung itself at the window.

A scream echoed down to Rose, and her fight instinct took over her fear as she instantly recognized it as Donna's.

"Stay here," She said as she turned away from Tim.

"With a giant fracking wasp on the loose? Nah-uh, I'm staying with the Bad Wolf, thank you very much."

The two ran back toward the front the house as quick as their legs could carry them, Rose keeping the lead. They were nearly there when another scream stopped them short. Rose whipped her head around, her attention brought back to their destination by crashing of stone, and she charged on.

She skidded to a stop at the sight of the maid half crushed under a stone gargoyle, the Doctor, Donna, and Agatha all pouring out of the house to investigate. Rose and the Doctor exchanged a quick glance before he rushed to the maid's side with the two women in tow. Rose joined him, Tim right behind her.

"The … poor … child." She heard the maid gasp out as blood began to seep out the corner of her mouth.

A buzz humming louder above their heads caused Rose to look up, and then positioned herself ever so slightly in front of the Doctor. She stared down the wasp, and she almost felt like it was gloating. And just as the Doctor said, "there," it took off inside the manor.

"Come on," He said, jumping to his feet and taking her hand out of habit. He pulled her inside, barely sparing a glance over his shoulder to see if the others were right behind him.

"Hey, this makes a change. There's a monster, and we're chasing it." Donna noted with a bit of humor despite the situation.

"Never chased after a Zygon then." Rose replied.

"Neither have we." The Doctor said as he pulled her around the corner, the buzzing getting louder.

"We haven't?" Rose asked, feeling certain deep down inside that she had, in fact, chased one down with him. In England, sometime in the past. With other hims, she thought. But maybe this wasn't the right time to start to contemplate such things.

The five of them flew up the stairs, the buzzing growing to the point of deafening, and as they hit the top landing it was there. Waiting for them like it was goading the into playing a potentially dangerous game of tag.

"By all that's holy," Agatha gasped behind them.

"Oh, but you are wonderful." The Doctor said with deep appreciation.

The wasp made to fly at them, and Rose stepped quickly in front of the Doctor.

His hands gripped her shoulders and he leaned around her. "Now, just stop, stop right there." He said. "Just want to talk."

"Oi, fly boy," Donna said behind them, and what ever she did cause a bit of light to shine on the wasp and made it retreat back down the stairs.

"Don't let it get away!" The Doctor said, taking Rose's hand again and pulling her along. "Quick, before it reverts back to human form."

" _Human_?" Rose asked through their connection, and he quickly flooded her with everything that she didn't see and hear while she was away from him. She saw the goop, the interviews he did with Agatha, perhaps a little bit too much of her calling him clever.

She rolled her eyes, trying to ignore the smugness that leaked through along with the urge to find the alien.

As they came to an empty hall, they noticed the lack of buzzing at exactly the same time.

"Where are you? Come on, show yourself!" The Doctor yelled out. Rose felt his disappointment as all the doors in the hall opened and a different member of the garden party stuck their head out quizzically. "Oh, that's just cheating!" He said with exasperation.

"What's going on?" Lady Eddison asked, stepping out into the hall.

"There's been another murder." The Doctor said, both regretful and exasperated, his tone undecided between the two.

"Who?" Lady Eddison asked.

"I'm afraid is was Miss Chandrakala." Agatha said, and a mournful gasp came from Lady Eddison.

The pour woman was nearly on her knees from grief when the butler caught her beneath the arms, helping her back up and supporting her as best he could be Roger came to his mother's side.

"Perhaps we should return to the drawing room." The Butler suggested, and everyone nodded in agreement, heading that way with only the sound of Lady Eddison's sobs filling the heavy silence.

* * *

 

"So, explain how exactly a giant wasp can masquerade as a human?" Rose asked after the room had cleared of the guests and grieving family, Donna gone to check on Agatha, leaving just the Doctor, Tim and herself in a small study. Maybe it was the drawing room, Rose wasn't really sure nor did she really care for the names of these things.

"Yeah, that little tidbit was kinda extreme." Tim said as he walked about the room, running his hand over a locked armoir.

"Well, lots of aliens take on the look of humans to blend in. Rose and I've encountered quite a few over the years. You had too, with the family." The Doctor replied, and Tim arched his brow. "They took on the bodies of people from around you neighborhood."

"Yeah, I guess." Tim said. "But is that what's going on here?"

"Maybe." The Doctor shrugged as he collapsed into one of the four chairs surrounding a small table. "And to answer your question, Sweetheart, it's not much different than the Slitheen."

"Sweetheart?" Tim smirked.

The Doctor shrugged, a light grin on his face.

"Alright, so, giant wasp is walking among us, yeah? Anyway we can detect it? What do wasps like, is it something we could, I dunno, use to draw it out?" Rose asked as she sat down in the chair next to the Time Lord.

"Drawing it out," The Doctor said slowly. "Not a bad idea."

"Seriously?" Tim asked. "Cause I'm pretty sure that's a fracking terrible idea. Let's leave the wasp alone, I say. Stinger on that thing be a lot worse than a little pinch."

The Doctor and Rose both hummed in agreement as excited chatter made it's way to them.

"Doctor!" Donna called out, and he turned in his chair toward the door while Rose looked over her shoulder to see the ginger and Agatha rush into the room. "Look what Agatha found in the floor bed."

The author plopped down a small, beautiful box on the small table. The Doctor stood, opening it and going through it, shifting trays and revealing various keys and picks.

"Oh, someone came here tooled up." He said eagerly.

"Lock pick," Tim said from behind them.

"Right on the money, there Timmy boy. Exactly what a thief would use."

"Like the Unicorn!" Agatha exclaimed. "Here's here."

"The Unicorn and the wasp," The Doctor mumbled as the butler came into the room.

"Your drinks, ladies and gentlemen."

"Very good, Greeves," He said as he took the two limes and sodas from the tray, handing one down to Rose while sipping the other.

"I'm gonna pass, actually." Tim said behind them as Rose sipped her own drink. Something about it was off, but she couldn't place what.

"As you wish." Greeves said before leaving the room.

The Doctor plopped back down beside Rose, looking to Agatha and Donna as they placed their drinks on the table between them.

"How about the science stuff? What did you find?" Donna asked, the Doctor.

He reached in his jacket, pulling out a test tube filled with a gold colored slime. "From what I can tell between the smell of this and the giant stinger, it's a Vespiform. They've got hives in the Silfrax galaxy." He explained. "Though how and why it's disguising itself as human I'm not entirely sure.

"Again, you talk like Edward Lear." Agatha commented. Rose looked over her shoulder to Tim to see if he was just as confused. He shrugged, shook his head slightly, and resumed his lean against the armoir.

"And this Vespiform is acting like a character in one of your books," The Doctor said to Agatha, about to take another sip of his drink.

Rose reflectively reached out and stopped him, her brain having caught up to her as to  _why_ the drink seemed off. She didn't know what it was in there, but the bitter taste ran through her mind and connected with an incident someone tried to pull on her three years before. An innocent encounter where a rich woman decided she had wanted the Doctor for herself and sought to get rid of the competition.

" _Poison."_  Rose screamed in her mind at him when their skin brushed, and the Doctor reflectively dropped the glass in his hand on the floor.

The burn started to go through Rose's body, and she felt the Doctor tense.

"What, what is it?" Donna asked them.

"We've been poisoned." The Doctor said before arching in pain.

"What do we do?" Donna asked, jumping from her seat and kneeling down beside the Doctor as Rose began to find it hard to breathe.

"Tim, carry Rose to the kitchen at a run." The Doctor said as he started clamoring out of his seat. "She's going to black out any second."

Through the haze quickly enveloping her, Rose heard Agatha say something about cyanide as Tim's arms scooped her up.

"I got ya, Wolf Girl." He said before the world went black.

* * *

 

Either Rose was lighter than she looked, or Tim was stronger, because if there was one thing Donna knew without a doubt is that Rose was literal dead weight. And if they didn't find a way to help the Doctor soon, she'd stay that way as her alien joined her. Then Donna and and Tim would be stuck together in 1926 with nothing to get them by.

And wasn't that a terrifying thought.

They burst into the kitchen, startling the wait stuff and cooks as the Doctor grabbed the young Davenport and screamed. "Ginger beer!"

"I beg your pardon?" Davenport scoffed.

"I need ginger beer," The Doctor said as he went for the shelves, sweeping and tossing things off until he found what he was looking for. He staggered as he opened the bottle, leaned against the workstation in the center of the room as he unscrewed the bottle and drank a substantial amount of the contents before pouring the rest on his head.

"I'm an expert in poisons, Doctor. There's no cure, it's fatal. Rose is already gone."

The Doctor spit out the ginger beer that fell in his mouth. "Rose will come back around in a minute, but if she's going to stay that way I need to stimulate the inhibited enzymes into reversal." He groaned in pain. "Protein! I need protein. And Tim, set Rose down, skin against mine somehow."

Donna set about the kitchen, looking for something with protein. She noted a jar of walnuts, picked it up and whirled around.

"Will this work?" She asked as Tim wrapped Rose's hand around the Doctor's ankle.

"Brilliant." He said as he took the jar, cramming as much of the contents in his mouth as he could and chewed.

"Salt." Rose's voice came through weak and cracked. "He, he, he needs salt." She said, and Donna noted that she was ashen, her eyes still closed.

Donna turned sharply, found a brown bag of salt, and handed it to him. He vehemently shook his head as he swallowed the nuts. "Too salty." He gasped out.

"Too Salty?" Donna asked incredulously.

"What about this?" Agatha said, handing the Doctor a jar. With barely more than a glance, he unscrewed the cap and shoved dumped what ever was in it in his mouth.

"What was that?" Donna asked as the smell hit her nose.

"Anchovies," Agatha replied, a touch of pride coming through the secondhand panic.

"I'm pregnant." Rose murmured from the floor, and Donna whipped her head down to look at her.

"How!?" She asked the blonde, and all the Doctor could do was shake his head.

"He needs a shock," Rose said, her voice a little stronger. "Tried."

"I think your daughter's hot." Tim offered, only earning a glare from the Doctor.

He swallowed the anchovies. "Not shocking. Not appreciated." He gasped out.

Without thinking about how it would taste, or even what she was doing, Donna reached over and grabbed the Doctor's face, pulling his alien mug to hers and kissed him firmly on the lips.

He was cool, boarding cold, and he tasted like salty, disgusting fish, and weird alien something. She heard Rose get back on her feet, and used that as her cue to let go of the Doctor.

As she did, he breathed out a dark, gray cloud of smoke into the air above their heads. He took a moment to breathe, wiping the corner of his mouth.

"Detox," He said, smiling now that the danger had passed. "Should probably do that more often, good for the skin." He turned to Rose, stepping toward her and clutching her face gently, stroking the apples of her cheeks with his thumbs. "You alright?" He asked.

"Yeah," She nodded, brushing his ginger beer soaked hair from his forehead in a loving gesture.

"Doctor, you and your wife are impossible." Agatha said in disbelief, a smile of wonder tugging at her lips. "Who are you?"

"Someone's worst nightmare." Tim said from where he stood out of the way.

"Oh yes," The Doctor said. "But I think before we get around to that, I'm gonna need a bath." He smacked his lips. "And something to clean my teeth with." He said, sticking his tongue out and wrinkling his nose. "Certainly can't kiss Rose like this."

"Oi, you kissed me!" Donna said, only just realizing she still tasted him and anchovies on her lips. Her own face screwed up, and she quickly tried to wipe the flavor away.

"Oh, you did that on your own." The Doctor pointed out. "Crude, but affective. Remind me to send you flowers."

Donna shook her head, turning to Davenport who still seemed completely flabbergasted by everything that just happened. "Can you get me another sidecar, hold the poison?" Donna asked him. "I need a little detox of my own."

"Yes, Ma'am." He said quickly, turning away and getting right on the drink making.

"I'm going to get cleaned up." The Doctor said, and he and Rose left the kitchen hand in hand.

"Survived a poisoning, the both of them." Agatha shook her head. "And she without any aid."

"Barmy, the both of them." Donna said in explanation. Davenport handed her a drink, and she swallowed back half of it. "How about you, me, and the twig back there go breath some fresh air while we wait for dinner to start?"

* * *

 

Rose sat beside the cast iron tub, running her fingers through the Doctor's damp hair after already cleaning it for him. He wouldn't allow her in with him, unsure how much of the cyanide would have still been seeping from his pours, or what soaking in the water would do to her if it still had been.

They'd been silent for the most part, his shields raised and hers very low in an effort to comfort him when she noticed the storm in his eyes. Too much happened, too much of it he couldn't control, and like so many times before the Doctor was trying shoulder all the bad. There wasn't much Rose could do to convince him not to.

"How much of it did you feel?" He asked quietly, the subtle pain in his voice piercing Rose in the heart.

She swallowed the hurt. "Not a lot." She replied, running his hair through her fingers.

"Was it painful?" He asked, shifting a bit in the water.

She shook her head, then realized he couldn't really see. "Not really," She replied. "Sorta, I dunno, burned a bit." She replied seeing his hand clench through the slight murk in the water of the tub. "I didn't feel anything you did."

"Good." He said, head moving as if he meant to nod a bit. A moment later his breath shuddered, and he reached up for the hand in her hair and pressed a kiss to her palm. He then placed it firmly against his cheek, and Rose was taken by surprise to feel a tear brush against it. "I love you, but there are so many times I hate what you've done." He said, his voice shaking. "I hate that someone targeting me could hurt you. Hate knowing that I risk your life along with mine. I know why you did it, I'll be forever grateful for it, but I just." He shuddered. "I  _hate_  the consequence."

"I would have been dead today regardless." Rose said, voice barely above a whisper. "If it wasn't for … I wouldn't have come back from that."

"I know." He said, turning and kissing her palm, her wrist, her arm before pressing his forehead against the place he last kissed. "I know, I just … I'm scared, Rose. I'll always be scared of losing you."

She nodded, swallowing the lump in her throat as his shields dropped and she was hit with the storm of emotions he had brewing inside. Love, fear, anger, resentment, appreciation, they circled and hit with force.

She shifted her arm, took his chin in her hand and tilted his head just enough so she could twist around and kiss him properly. To prove she was alive, that he was too, and that they were alright in every way possible. There would be no progression to more heated things, that could happen later in the seclusion of their bedroom, but this would anchor them. This would reassure. This would get them through the night, and with any luck, hold off the nightmares both were sure to come.

* * *

 

Dinner went on as expected, though the heat lightning against the dark evening sky made for an interesting atmosphere. Especially knowing what the Doctor had gone ahead and done after he soniced his suit clean post bath. Only she, Donna, Tim, and Agatha knew the truth to his plan, and Rose had gone down the kitchen to aid him with it. Distracting the cooks with asking for cooking tips had been child's play, especially when she plied on that she and "John" really didn't want to have any staff if they could help it, preferring to live as simple as possible.

So after the soup had been served, and a few spoon fulls had gone to everyone's mouths, she sat back and waited. Watching, noting the Doctor lean forward on his elbows while taking in the room himself.

"A terrible day for all of us." He said, likely noting how everyone fidgeted. "The professor struck down, Miss Chandrakala taken cruelly from us. And yet, we still take dinner." He said.

"We are British," Lady Eddison said with a haughty tone. "What else must we do?"

"Then someone tried to poison me and my wife. Probably figured it was easier to let her be collateral damage, seeing as how we had the same drink. Big mistake that, trying to poison us. Could have lead to the whole lot of you being pretty badly, well," he shrugged. "Could have been ugly, I suppose. But instead of allowing Rose to do what is in her nature, I came up with a better idea."

"And what would that be?" The reverend asked as he and the other men in the room looked at one another with amusement.

"Poison." The Doctor said simply. Eyes from all the party goers looked at him with suspicion, and Rose smirked just a touch. "I've laced the soup with pepper."

The Colonel smiled. "Ah! I thought it was jolly spicy."

"But the active ingredient of pepper is piperine." The Doctor said as he took his napkin and set it on the table, looking around the room. "Traditionally used as an insecticide." The guests looked at each other in confusion. "Anyone got the shivers?"

In a quick flash, lightning struck as a hard gust of wind blew the windows open and snuffed out the candles. The power cut out, and a moment later the sound of buzzing filled the room.

"Doctor," Rose said in warning as he got to her feet, making herself a bigger target for the giant insect.

"Shh, it's okay." He said, taking her hand and trying to calm her.

"No, it can't be." Lady Eddison said barely above a whisper.

"Show yourself, Demon." Agatha egged it on, standing as well.

"Ms Christie." Rose whispered, gently pushing the author back slightly.

When the wasp seemed to appear in the next bolt of lightning, Rose felt the Doctor move. His hand hold leaving hers.

"Out!" He cried repeatedly, and Rose turned to ensure that Tim and Donna were following him. They moved to a small room, and Rose closed the door once they were inside, standing in front of it and acting as another barrier. She saw two shadows move about the room quickly, both human. The buzzing stopped just as the sickening sound of flesh being pierced his Rose's ear, a thud and a gargle echoing in the room before the door behind her opened.

She turned, amused for a second to see both the Doctor and Tim emerging with swords and looking around the room before the power came back.

The woman Rose knew as Robina was still sitting where she was before, looking about the room before her eyes widened in terror. The reverend somehow ended up against the wall, looking shaken but not as scared as his body language tried to say. The colonel had shifted in his chair, and the wait stuff were crouched a few feet away from her where they had been standing previously.

"My necklace. The firestone is gone." Lady Eddison's voice hit her ears, but Rose couldn't pull her attention away from the young man, Davenport.

Slowly he rose to his feet, staring sadly at the table, his eyes glistening. "Roger." He choked out, and Rose whipped her head around to see what had been the reason behind the gurgling.

Roger was face down in his soup with a knife in his back instead of the stinger Rose had been expecting.

"Holy hell, this is getting more and more messed up." Tim said softly as Lady Eddison moved steadily to her son and clutched his body.

"You should go back to the TARDIS," Rose said to him from over her shoulder.

"No way. Not now."

"Tim, I didn't spend all that time getting killed for you just for you to wind up the next victim of a murder mystery." She countered with a quiet snap.

"And what about Donna?" He challenged.

"How else would you have gotten into the TARDIS, you don't have a key?"

"Oi, Blondie, if you think for one moment I'm gonna hide you've gotta another thing comin'. After all,  _I'm_  the plucky sidekick here."

"Donna, I need to know the two of you are safe." Rose said, turning to face Donna head on. "They already tried to kill the Doctor and me, they're not going to be stupid enough to try again. Not when it seems like we're invincible. But you two …."

"Rose." Donna said, placing a hand on each other shoulder as she spoke in a gentle voice. "I know, sweetheart. I know you want us safe. And we will be, right here, with, you and Spaceman. Promise. Let us see this through to the end, okay?" She stepped closer, smiling coyly. "No one would dare mess with the Bad Wolf, not even a giant bug."

Rose took a deep breath and nodded, relenting that they wouldn't leave and trying not to let on how much Donna's trust in her meant.

"We should go discuss things in a more quiet place." The Doctor said to them. He turned to Tim, handing him his sword. "Put that back on the wall with yours, meet us in the drawing room down the hall." He turned after Tim took the weapon with a nod, leading the charge out of the room and away from the mourning family and staff.

* * *

 

They had been silent since entering the luxurious room, Agatha on one couch with Donna, Rose sitting on the one opposite while looking at the Doctor. He stood in front of an ornate mantle, his posture rigid as he stood with his feet apart and his hands in his pockets. His eyes were dark, intense, focused. The Oncoming Storm deep in thought, trying to figure out the mess they found themselves in that put their companions at risk.

Tim walked in, closed the door, took in everyone, then moved to stand behind Rose. She looked up at him, giving him a brief grin that he acknowledged with a nod. He stood, consciously or unconsciously, exactly as the Doctor had without the air of danger behind it.

Donna sighed, and Rose noted how she had the end of her long necklace wrapped around her fingers. She met the blonde's eye. "That poor footman." She said. "Roger's dead and he can't even mourn him. 1926, more like the dark ages."

"Does anyone know anything about the necklace?" Agatha asked, glancing about the room.

"I head them talking a bit about it." Tim said. "Came from India, worth a lot."

"From India?" Donna asked.

"Brought back with her I guess."

"She was sick during that trip. Malaria. The Butler, Greeves, he said she was locked up for sick months after she returned. I know the necklace is worth a lot, but who would want a reminder of that?" Donna thought out loud, not really looking at anyone in particular as she spoke.

They remained silent for a bit, maybe all wondering about the same things or very different topics, but their attention was all turned to the Doctor when he finally spoke.

"It could sting, it could kill, it could wipe us all out in seconds. Why is it playing this game?" He said through his teeth.

Agatha shrugged. "Every murder is essentially the same; they are committed because somebody wants something."

"What does a Vespiform want?" The Doctor challenged.

"Doctor, stop it. The murderer is as human as you or I." Agatha replied, an undercurrent of annoyance in her voice.

Rose and Donna exchanged a glance but said nothing as the Doctor's face fell and his eyes let up.

"You're right!" He said with sudden realization. In a blink he was in front of Agatha, leaning in front of her. "I've been so caught up with the giant wasp that I've forgotten you're the expert."

"I'm not," Agatha insisted.

"Don't argue with him when he's willing to let someone be more clever than he is." Rose said, her mouth curling upward as Agatha blushed.

"I'm not clever, I'm just a purveyor of nonsense." She tried to counter.

"No, no, no, no, no." The Doctor insisted, shaking his head, and Rose could picture the grin on his face. "Plenty of people write detective stories, but yours are the best! And why are you so good, Agatha Christie? Because you understand. You've lived, you've fought, you've had your heart broken." He went on, and Rose could see the confidence growing in the author's eyes. "You know people, their passions, their hope, and despair, and anger. All of those tiny, huge things that can turn the most ordinary person into a killer. Just think, Agatha. If anyone can solve this, it's you."

* * *

 

Tim had never been one for murder mysterious. He hated the frustration of not knowing, and growing up getting secrets from the Universe he wasn't about to let a stupid paperback novel keep anything from him. So he was that kid who skipped to the last page, he skimmed the final chapters for the answer, who would later look up the spoilers on the Internet so he could go on and read without having to be deprived of knowing.

He played Clue growing up, but didn't enjoy the slowness of it all, nor that it would always be during a game when he couldn't somehow draw on the Universe to give him insight as to what cards were inside that stupid little envelop in the middle. He always guessed wrong, and would be bored waiting out the rest of the long, tedious process of other people solving.

And if he was being perfectly honest with himself, he was kind of bored watching Agatha and the Doctor do a back and forth with the party-goers. Oh all their secrets being revealed was entertaining, he supposed. It was kind of amusing to stand off to the side with Wolf Girl and watch, sipping tea (a little milk, no sugar, 'cause he's a badass) and being insanely thankful that he didn't grow up in British money the more they talked about buggering on. Because honestly, who can still keep on going after having three people die in their home? An insane person, that's who.

And he was looking firmly at the Lady Eddison on this one.

Because through out the day the Universe that would never let him cheat at Clue kept sending him thought things of a young woman dancing with a bee. Or wasp, rather, since that was the terrifying thing that looked like it could swallow him whole. And since it made next to no sense, he kept it to himself.

But as the Doctor literally pointed a finger at Lady Eddison, the Unicorn thief and the wheelchair faker already being flushed out, Tim was starting to wonder if maybe he should have let his thought things become known a little earlier. Especially after her crazy confession of doing it with a wasp alien.

"Last Thursday night, what were you doing?" The Doctor asked the Lady as she clutched a handkerchief in a dramatic fashion.

"I was in the library reading my favorite Agatha Christie, thinking about her plots, and how clever she must be." She replied after a moment of thought. "How is that relevant?" She asked the Doctor, looking at him quizzically.

"Just think, what else happened Thursday night?" The Doctor asked, putting his hands in his pockets as he turned to the reverend.

Everyone stared at him expectantly, poor Donna at the edge of her seat with eager anticipation.

"I'm sorry?" The poor, confused looking reverend asked the Doctor with a slight shake of his head.

"You said it on the lawn this afternoon. Last Thursday night, those boys broke into your church." The Doctor said with that eerie patience he had in the face of danger.

"That's correct." The reverend nodded. "I discovered the two of them. Thieves in the night. I was most perturbed, but I apprehended them." He said as if it wasn't a big deal.

Which, Tim realized, kinda was. Because he understood twig strength, he had a bit of it himself. With adrenaline pumping through his body, Wolf Girl's dead weight hadn't bothered him as he carried her down the stairs to the kitchen while she and the Doctor were dying. It wasn't until he was in the garden with Donna and Agatha, listening to them discuss her stories (some that hadn't been written, though he promised he wouldn't tell Storm Boy) that he realized how sore he was gonna be.

He sized up the reverend as the Doctor continued.

"Really? A man of God against two strong lads? A man in his forties? Or should I say forty exactly?" The Doctor said knowingly, pausing at just the right moment for dramatic effect.

"Oh my god!" Lady Eddison gasped, handkerchief going to her mouth.

"Now it's getting interesting," Tim said as he leaned in to Rose, getting her to giggle under her breath.

"Lady Eddison, your child, how old would he be now?" The Doctor asked of the love child Lady Eddison got knocked up with in India.

"Forty, he's forty!" She exclaimed, staring slack jawed at the reverend.

"Your child has come home." The Doctor said, a glint of triumph in his eyes.

"This is poppycock." The reverend said, shifting around in his seat.

"Oh? You said you were taught by the Christian Fathers." The Doctor said as he moved to stand in front of Tim and Wolf Girl. "Meaning you were raised in an orphanage."

"My son! It can't be?" Lady Eddison said in perfect soap opera fashion that made Tim snicker.

"You found those thieves, reverend, and you got angry. A proper, deep anger for the first time in your life, and it broke the genetic lock. You've changed." The Doctor almost teased. "After all these years, you knew who you were." He then, almost too quick for words, darted over to Agatha and plucked up the necklace that the skinny brunette, Unicorn, thief person had swiped off the dramatic lady and dangled it for the room to see. "Oh, and then it all kicks off, 'cause this isn't just a jewel, it's a Vespiform telepathic recorder. It's part of you, your brain, you very essence. When you activated, so did the Firestone. It beamed your full identity directly into your mind, and at the same time it absorbed the works of Agatha Christie directly from Lady Eddison. Mechanics of those novels formed a template in your brain. You've killed, in this pattern, because that's what you think the world is." The Doctor shrugged. "Turns out, we are in the middle of a murder mystery. One of yours, Dame Agatha."

"Dame?" The author said n surprise, whipping her head up to look at the Doctor.

He rubbed at the back of his neck, and Tim swore he saw Storm boy's ears go red. "Oh, sorry, not yet."

"And you say Donna's bad." Wolf Girl said with a smirk, earning her a loving glare and stern finger pointed in her direction from the Doctor. She smiled, tongue caught in her teeth, and crossed her arms.

"So, he killed them, yeah? Definitely?" Donna asked, bouncing a bit on her seat.

"Yes," The Doctor confirmed, and Tim wanted to whoop for joy.

"Well, this has certainly been a most entertaining evening." The reverend said as if it had been nothing more than an elaborate dinner party with a theme. No one at the table seemed to share this humor. "Really, you can't believe any of this. Surely, Lady Edizzz…."

He buzzed.

"Lady who?" The Doctor goaded.

"Lady Edizzzon." The reverend buzzed again, seeming to struggle against it. And Tim, well, if anyone asked he was determined to say that the goosebumps on his arms was because he was cold, and the hairs standing on the back of his neck was strictly to do with the electric static in the air from the lightning.

"Little bit of buzzing there, vicar?" The Doctor teased.

"Don't make me angry," he warned, standing up with his fists clenched into fists at his side.

Wolf Girl was gone in a second, standing in front of the Doctor, jerking her head toward Tim while looking at Donna. She nodded, moving to stand beside her fellow companion.

"Why, what happens when I make you angry?" The Doctor asked, hands in his pockets as he stood behind his Rose shield.

"Damn it, you humanzzzz. Worshiping your tribal sky godzzz. I am so much more. That night, the universe exploded in my mind. I wanted to take what wazzz mine." The reverend buzzed.

Admittedly, up until the confession, Tim was getting a little freaked out. But now, well, now he was back to trying not to laugh while picture B horror movies from his darker teen years.

"And you, Agatha Christie," The reverend cursed. "With your railway station bookstall romancezz. What'zzzz to stop me killing you?" He started to glow purple while the Lady Eddison, Queen of dramatics, cried out about her baby. "What'zzzz to stop me killing all of you?"

"Frack." Tim said dropping the tea cup on the floor as the reverend turned completely into a wasp and all hell broke loose around the sitting room. The rich British folk were all pushing and shoving, trying to back away and doing so into each other as the wasp turned toward them. He could see Wolf Girl looking frantically about, the Doctor gripping her arms as they seemed to try and figure out a way to get everyone out without her dying again. Or maybe death was the plan, he didn't know. All he knew was he'd hate for this to be the time to find out if he was allergic to stings.

"No!" Agatha cried out, holding up the necklace that caused all this trouble. It was glowing faintly, purple like the reverend was before. "No more murder! If my imagination made you kill, then my imagination will find a way to stop you, foul creature." She turned and ran from the room, and in a flash, the Doctor and Rose were out the door. Without thinking, he and Donna followed them and Tim pointedly ignored the buzzing following behind.

"Now it's chasing us." Donna said.

"Yeah, not so glad I skipped track right around now." He said as they turned and flew down the stairs. The Doctor opened the front door, waving everyone out and following just as Tim stepped into the night air. The door shut behind him as Agatha pulled up in front of the house, pounding on the horn.

The door broke behind him, the buzzing too loud for Tim's comfort.

"Over here! Come and get me, Reverend." Agatha taunted.

"Agatha, what are you doing?" The Doctor asked as he rushed toward the car.

"If I started this Doctor, then I must stop it." She said before turning away and flooring it as much as those old cars could.

"What now?" Rose asked as the Doctor headed toward another car.

"Grand theft auto, Wolf Girl. Just like old times." Tim replied as he and the women rushed to follow the Time Lord. Rose was in the front with him while Tim and Donna piled in the back as the car took off. "Not exactly the speed I remembered, though." He said as he watched the wasp fly ahead of them, both cars and the giant insect holding a steady speed.

"You said this is the night Agatha Christie loses her memory." Donna said to the Doctor like it was a protest against what they were doing.

"This isn't a fixed point Donna, 's not like Pompeii." Rose said to the Ginger while the Doctor concentrated on the road. "She could die tonight, and everything would just change from there. Small at first, then expanding."

"But she's so big, so, so, important. What happens if this is the night she dies?" Donna asked.

No one answered, never a good sign.

In the distance a lake came up on their left, and Agatha pulled off to that side of the road before stepping out of the car. The necklace glowed brighter in her hand as she held it over her head, and while he couldn't hear her over the car engine, Tim knew she was taunting it.

The pulled up behind her car and hopped out, and Agatha moved her hand around taunting the wasp physically as she lead it this way and that.

"She's controlling it." Donna realized out loud.

"It's mind is based on her thought processes. They're linked."

"Quite so, Doctor." Agatha confirmed. "If I die, then this creature might die with me."

"Oh that's just wrong." Tim said, shaking his head. "Nah-uh. Nope. I think, Agatha, we've already seen enough of that kind of link today, eh?" He tried to joke, smiling uncomfortably.

"And it was inspiring." Agatha said. "May not be for love, but to have two beings joined in such a way, to make sure one ends when the other does."

The wasp flinched as if it had a moment of freedom, making to go at the author.

"Agatha, please," Wolf Girl implored, slowly stepping toward the author and putting her back to the wasp. "'S got to be another way, yeah? You have so much to live for, so many wonderful things ahead of you."

Tim could see Agatha waver a little as the Doctor stepped up beside her. He looked to the wasp. "You're not meant to be like this," he tried to reason with the insect. "You've got the wrong template in your mind. You're father loved humans, loved your mother. You could live like he wanted to, among them."

The wasp flinched again, it's stinger getting dangerously close to Rose's back. Tim could see her shoulders tense as if she braced herself for the sting.

"It's not listening." Donna said as she reached charged over and snatched the necklace from Agatha and threw it into the lake.

Without hesitation, the wasp thing followed it into the water. Once below the surface it didn't reemerge, a purple glow coloring the water where it went under.

"How do you kill a wasp?" Donna asked redundantly. "Drown it."

"Donna, that thing couldn't help itself." The Doctor protested.

"Neither could I." She replied. "I didn't want to see Rose stabbed with a stinger, did you? It was us or it."

The Doctor lost his fight then, watching the water intently as Wolf Girl put her arm around him, leaning her head on his shoulder.

"Death comes as the end, and justice is served." Agatha said, turning to the Doctor and Rose. She opened her mouth as if to say something, then her face contorted in pain, and she collapsed to the ground.

"What's happening?" Rose asked as the Doctor knelt down and held Agatha at the shoulders.

"The Firestone. It's part of the Vesipform's mind. It's dying, and it's still connected to Agatha." He explained. Before any of them could move to do something, a purple light surrounded the author and she went limp against the Doctor. He looked up, and Tim followed his gaze to the water where the purple light faded. "He let her go. Right at the end, the Vespiform chose to save someone's life."

"Severed the connection." Rose said with a touch of awe in her voice.

"Like his father would have wanted him to." The Doctor said as he turned Agatha to collect her in his arms.

"Is she alright, though?" Donna asked.

"She'll be fine, mind a little fuzzy but … oh!" The Doctor said as he stood, looking between the two women and Tim as the smile grew. "That's it, then! The amnesia. She'll forget everything that happened today. The wasp, the murders."

"Us." Donna realized sadly.

"Yeah, but we've solved the mystery of Agatha Christie." He said with glee, racing back to the car the borrowed. "Rose, Donna, hop in the back. You'll have to hold Agatha steady on your lap. Tim, hop in the front, my boy." The Doctor said with manic energy, waiting as patiently as he could for everyone to follow his instruction. Once everyone was settled as they should be, the Doctor climbed in behind the wheel, started the car, and headed back toward the manor.

"Okay, explain." Tim said. "How is this solving the mystery?"

The Doctor looked over at him with a grin. "Tomorrow morning, her car gets found by the lake."

"'Kay," Tim said when the Doctor paused.

He didn't get an answer until the pulled into the manor's driveway. The Time Lord hopped out of the car, scooped Agatha off the laps of Rose and Donna. Then he waited for the women and Tim to join him before he turned away from the house and headed toward the TARDIS.

Rose rushed ahead, unlocking the doors.

"A few days later," The Doctor said, adjusting the author in his arms before rushing into the TARDIS. He moved swiftly, placing Agatha on the jumpseat, and she groaned a little. "She'll turn up at a hotel in Harrogate with no idea of what just happened." He moved around the console, flipping switches and pushing buttons before the ship groaned to life. When the landing shudder echoed through the room, Agatha groaned again.

Rushing to her side, the Doctor and Rose each draped an arm over their shoulders, assisting th author out of the TARDIS and into the sunlight of another day. After a few feet they ducked out from under her, allowing the author to stagger a bit as she righted herself.

Tim noted the sign in front of the building they were parked a little ways from, noting it was a hotel. Agatha continued on her own, the Doctor, Rose, Donna, and him following just enough to make sure she was alright.

Agatha paused, turned, looked at them with confusion, then kept going up the stairs.

They all turned and headed back to the TARDIS.

"But what about Lady Eddison? The Colonel, the staff, what about them?" Donna asked as they headed inside.

"Shameful story, they'd never talk of it. Too British." The Doctor teased a bit. "While the Unicorn does a bunk back to London town, she could never say she was there."

"And Agatha?" Rose asked.

"Oh, great life. Met another man, married again," The Doctor paused in his ramblings to look down at his left hand, the gold band on his ring finger nearly forgotten to Tim and possibly to him as well. He plucked it off, stuffing it in his blazer pocket. "She saw the world, and wrote. Wrote, and wrote. In fact!" He said kneeling down and pulling up a piece of grating. "Where is it? Oh, hold on, here it is." He said as he pulled a small trunk out. "'C'. Cyberman," he said as he pulled a robot head out, and Rose flinched away from it as he set it behind them. "Carrionites." He pulled out a crystal ball type thing, and Tim swore he saw the faces of three hags in it. He glanced to Wolf Girl as she took it and gently placed it behind the Doctor. "Ah! Here we go, Christie, Agatha." He pulled out a book and showed it to the three of them. Tim snorted at the giant wasp on the cover. "Look at that."

"She did remember," Donna said as she plucked up the book.

"Somewhere in the back of her mind, it all lingered." The Doctor said with a huge grin. "And that's not all, look at the copyright page." He said to Donna.

She opened it quickly, skimming it as he mouth fell open. "Published in the year five billion?"

"People never stopped reading her work. She's the best selling novelist of all time."

"Seriously?" Tim challenged.

"Oh yes."

"But she never knew." Donna said as he face fell. "She never thought she was any good, and now …."

"Now you know." Rose reassured, putting a hand on Donna's back. "Charles Dickens worried if his books lasted, Shakespeare wondered the same of his plays. That's the thing 'bout the greats, they worry they aren't good enough. Makes 'em strive for better."

"Explains why King isn't the best selling novelist of all time." Tim mused.

The Doctor snickered as he collected the discarded items and put them all back into the trunk. He slid it back into the space below, replaced the grating, then hopped up on his feet.

"So, Tim, whaddya think? Still wanna stick around?" He asked.

Tim smirked. "Hell yes." He replied.

"Alright then." The Doctor stuck his hands in his pockets and dug something out, taking Tim's hand and slapping something metal with teeth in it. "Welcome aboard." He said, and the TARDIS hummed happily in Tim's mind.

"How many of those do you have?" Rose asked, grinning with her tongue between her teeth.

"Well," he tugged on his ear. "She sorta makes them as needed. Technically speaking there are seven active at all times, but some keys will become useless, magically get lost or forgotten when, umm, the companions decide to leave."

"Like Martha?" Wolf Girl asked.

"And Mickey, yeah." The Doctor nodded.

"So there's an unknown amount of keys to a time ship out there?" Donna asked with a hint of amusement.

"Well, no, not exactly. Not all companions get keys, and the TARDIS has changed them now and then, so technically speaking."

"Oi, Spaceman. It's fine. Just as long as we aren't gonna land somewhere and return to find some put out, peeved off former friend waiting inside for ya." Donna replied. "And now, I'm going to change into something much more comfy. It's been a long day, could use a movie and a big bowl of popcorn."

"Anything by Agatha Christie get made into a movie?" Tim asked, making to follow Donna down the hall.

She snorted, dropping her arm around Tim. "Psychboy, you're about to be educated on her greatness."

"What ever you say, Time Lady." He countered.

Tim ignored the flinch in Donna's arm, or the curious way she looked at him.

He couldn't help it, the thought things screamed that at him when Donna was around. And he'd see it, various flashes, of Donna in a suit going a mile a minute, of her being way more awesome then he already thought her to be.

If it wasn't for the unease the thought things brought him, he'd think it was a good thing.


	20. Silence in the Library pt 1

"It's quiet in here." The Doctor noted, and Rose hummed in agreement, looking up at the unmoving time rotor. She and the Doctor were sitting on the jumpseat together, their companions somewhere deep in the bowels of the ship. Him in his blue suit, she in boots and leggings and a over-sized sweater, Rose couldn't imagine how different they would look to their past counter parts if they'd seen them.

Curling into him just a bit more, she nearly whispered, "Even the TARDIS is unusually silent."

As if to prove a point, the TARDIS hummed at that moment, reminding Rose of a contented sigh.

"We've had a busy week." The Doctor remarked, playing with the ends of her hair. "Had to make sure Tim was thoroughly baptized in space and time travel, even if it was all on the tamer side."

"You might just be getting the hang of making trouble the bits in between." Rose teased.

"Oi! Not like you've spent every day of the last seven years being chased by something or other, Rose Tyler."

"Not unless you count you." She teased again, biting her lip as she grinned and making the Doctor chuckle in his throat. It was contagious, and her giggles made her smile wider with her tongue between her teeth.

"You know," He said when the laughter faded. "I've been meaning to say that I noticed." Rose furrowed her brow, and his eyes filled with the affection that trickled through their lightly touching hands. "When we were with Agatha, the amount of danger we were all in, and you remained calm. Not even a year ago and you might have gotten aggressive. But you're calm."

"That a bad thing?" Rose asked, knowing the answer already.

"No," He shook his head. "No, it's not. You know nothing would change how I feel about you.  _My love for you is not bound to a body, but a soul. It can not be changed or altered by anything except to grow stronger and more resilient. It is forever."_ He said the last part in his language, but after hearing it so often over the years Rose knew the meaning of that song-like phrase by heart. "But it is wonderful to see you doing so much better." He said.

"Yeah?" Rose asked.

"Oh yes," He said, leaning in toward her.

"Oi, you two!" Donna's voice halted the Doctor, his eyes shifting from Rose to their companion behind her. "No macking on each other in the console room." She said, and Rose shifted around to see Donna having taken a double take at the monitor, then shake her head. Rose looked, wondering what she saw, only seeing the normal circular language of the Time Lords on the screen.

"I don't care about the macking, just don't get frisky." Tim said as he sauntered over and plopped down at Rose's feet. "So what we doing today? Surfing on the moon, cocktails on Jupiter?"

"Cocktails are what's done on the moon, surfing best left to the planet Aquaticus, though it's hard to find a point in time when there's enough land mass for a humanoid to stand on. Whole thing floods too easily. Though if it is beach adventures you strive for, we could make a stop to Solodaris 3. Nice little place Rose and I venture to quite often." The Doctor jumped up, inputted the coordinates and flipped the switch before Rose had time to shift and stand. He glanced at the monitors, then did a double take. "Huh," he said.

"What?" Rose asked as she got to her feet.

"Coordinates must have slipped my mind. Thought those were the right ones, but there's nothing out there. Just deep space." He said, reaching in his pockets and putting on his glasses.

Rose glanced down at the panel but shrugged. "I honestly don't remember them." She said.

The TARDIS hummed in confusion for a moment before it seemed like something got her attention. A blip of giddy came over them, and the Doctor started digging around in his blazer pockets. Pulling out the billfold of psychic paper, Rose read it over his shoulder.

_The Library. Come as soon as you can. R.S._

" _The Library?"_  Rose asked as she placed a hand on his. He showed her an image of one of the places he'd taken her just after they met Donna the first time, during a period when Rose was getting over the loss of her Mum and neither of them wanted to address the remaining huon particles in her system. She'd wanted quiet, and the planet had been anything but despite the concept of it.

"Actually, I have a brilliant idea on where to go." The Doctor exclaimed, startling Rose and likely the two companions with her. He did his manic dance around the console, and the TARDIS quickly transported them to their destination. A double check on the coordinates and the monitor informed them they reached their destination, though the excitement the TARDIS had was enough that Rose doubted she'd have taken them off course. As they headed for the door the TARDIS sent her a warning hum, and she looked to the Doctor to see he had paused at the door, seeming to receive it too.

There were two things out there waiting for them: one the TARDIS seemed to love, the other something she feared their safety over.

"Umm, why's the ship jittery?" Tim asked, and Rose whipped around to smile at him.

"She gets like that when the Doctor can't drive. He did forget the coordinates for an entire planet, after all." Rose covered quickly, the Doctor giving her an indigent "Oi" while the TARDIS hummed like a giggle.

"So when we step out those doors, what are we gonna get?" Donna asked, as she followed them down the ramp.

The Doctor opened the doors, stepping out and holding them open for Rose, Donna, and Tim to step outside.

"Books!" The Doctor exclaimed, his voice echoing a bit and making Rose cringe as she stepped further into the sunlight streaming in from the large picture windows. "People never really stop loving books. Here we are, 51st century. By now you've got holovids, direct to brain downloads, fiction mist, but you need the smell."

"New book smell is pretty fracking great." Tim said, hands in his leather coat pocket as the Doctor strode casually toward a door and pulled it open. They all followed the Time Lord outside and down a small set of stairs. "Though direct-to-brain downloads. Have the upload portion, yet?"

"Oh yes," The Doctor said. "Made creating and accessing new stories pretty easy, though the erotica boom forced them to implement laws and various clearances before anyone could publish. Especially in this century."

"So where are we, exactly?" Donna asked as she leaned on the rail, looking out over the landscape of buildings.

"The Library." The Doctor replied, leaning on the rail beside her. "So big it doesn't need a name, just a great big 'the'."

"It's like a city." Donna said with awe.

"It's a world, literally a world. The whole core of the planet is the index computer, the biggest hard drive ever. And up here, every book ever written. Jeffrey Archer, Bridget Jones, Summer Falls. Brand new editions specially printed. We're near the equator, so …" The Doctor licked his finger and held it up in the air. "Oh! Sci-fi adventures! Love Sci-fi adventures, even if they do get most of it wrong."

"Oh, big surprise." Donna muttered as Rose stood on the other side of the Doctor, looking over the books left in a pile. She froze, heart stopping in her chest as she saw  _Forest of the Dead, a Wolf and Storm adventure_ by Timothy J. Latimer. She glanced at the Doctor who looked wide eyed at the book as well, and without thinking Rose nudged the pile and sent it over the railing.

"Nice one, Wolf Girl." Tim teased as he came to stand beside her. "Just made someone's job more difficult. Hate to be the guy who has to fetch books falling off the side."

"Yeah," The Doctor said thoughtfully, and Rose didn't have to touch him to know how relieved he was for that move. But despite the palatable relief of an avoided paradox, the Doctor still looked worried. Standing up straighter, he glanced around. "And you know what I just realized? No one's come to see what happened. In fact, there's no one here at all." He looked around them and turned to Rose. "It's silent."

He took his screwdriver out of his blazer and moved swiftly to an information kiosk.

"It is a library." Donna reminded.

"Yeah, but 's different." Rose said as she moved to join her mate. "When we came here last even the quiet was noisy. 'S like there's no one here."

"Because there isn't." The Doctor said, looking over at them just as Rose arrived at his side. "I do a scan for your basic humanoids, and apart from us I get nothing."

"Nothing?" Donna said incredulously.

"Zip!" The Doctor said, popping the p. "Just us four, see?" He pointed to the screen, and after a quick scan a bright red '4' flashed on the screen. "But if I widen the parameters to any kind of life," he said, typing rapidly and standing back as the computer attempted to calculate before crashing with a giant 'Error' warning. "A million million. It gives up after a million million."

"What the hell?" Tim said, glancing up and around.

"But there's nothing here." Donna noted. "Just books. I mean, it's not the books, is it?"

"Oh, I'm getting flash backs to my childhood." Tim said as he suddenly eyed a leather bound book with suspicion.

The Doctor and Donna exchanged a glance before they both started reaching for a book a few feet away.

"Welcome!" A feminine voice startled them all, and Rose whipped around with her hands out to the side as if she could shield the other three from the sound.

She glanced around, moving slightly up the wide staircase toward the doors they'd come through. She looked over her shoulder to see the Doctor coming up behind her, Tim and Donna following close behind, and Rose continued back inside the room they landed in.

She hadn't noticed before, but Rose now realized they parked not all that far away from an information desk, and there seemed to be a human silhouette shaped thing behind the counter. As they got closer, it clicked and whirred and turned its head toward them.

Rose remembered this from the first time she was here. They were right creepy things, and when the Doctor explained why their faces were so life like she made him promise he'd never do that to her. Losing her face once was enough, she didn't want it taken even in death.

Though this one, she had to admit, was very pretty.

"I am courtesy Node 710/Aqua. Please enjoy The Library and respect the personal access codes of all your fellow readers regardless of species or hygiene taboo."

"Obviously not a University Library." Tim snorted.

"That face," Donna said, not being as relaxed as Tim seemed to be. "It looks real."

Rose glanced at the Doctor who rubbed his neck nervously. "Yeah, don't worry about it." He said.

"A statue with a real face, though?" Donna said, clearly worrying about it. "It's a hologram or something, isn't it?"

"No, but really, it's fine." The Doctor insisted, waving his hands about.

"Additional," The Node said pleasantly. "There follows a brief message from the Head Librarian for urgent attention. It has been edited for tone and content by the Felman Lux Automated Decency Filter. Message follows: 'Run. For God's sake, run. Nowhere is safe. The Library has sealed itself. We can't - oh, they're here.'" The Node repeated the sounds of screams and wet choking in it's cheery tone then added, "Message ends. Please switch off your mobile comm units for the comfort of other readers."

The four of them remained quiet for a minute.

"That." Tim said, "Was not what I expected."

"So that's why we're here." The Doctor said, turning to the Node. "Any other messages, same date stamp?" He asked.

"One additional message. This message carries a …."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, just play it." The Doctor hurried the Node along.

"Message follows: 'count the shadows. For God's sake, remember. If you want to live, count the shadows.' Message ends."

As the message played, the Doctor became increasingly pale, glancing about the room.

"Alright, you heard the lady." The Doctor said, "Stay out of the shadows."

He turned, heading toward another door, and the others followed.

When he stepped into a room with high bookshelves, Rose paused. "Stay out of the shadows, yeah? So why are we in a room where shadows would be likely. "

"Still light enough out for now." The Doctor said, glancing around.

"You said 'that's why we're here'," Donna noted, sound a little annoyed. "We didn't just pop over for a leisurely read. Why'd we come here?"

"Got a message on the psychic paper." The Doctor admitted, reaching into his pocket and handing Donna the billfold.

Tim came up to read it over her shoulder, and Rose noted the way his eyes became unfocused after a quick read of the sentence. He remained standing behind Donna, half leaned toward her while staring off into nothing.

"Who's RS?" She asked as she handed the Doctor back the paper, neither of them seeming to notice Tim.

"No idea," The Doctor admitted as he pocketed the billfold. He looked around the room, becoming very still. "Oh," He said, slow and drawn, "Oh that's very, very not good."

"What's not?" Rose asked, and he gestured behind Donna and Tim.

She turned just as a light shut itself off.

"Run!" The Doctor shouted, snapping Tim out of his haze.

The Doctor grabbed Rose's hand and the four turned the opposite direction and legged it as fast and hard as they could until they came to a door. The Doctor let go of Rose's hand and nearly crashed into the door, pulling and pushing against it with no luck.

"Is it locked?" Donna asked with a hint of panic.

"Jammed!" The Doctor countered. "Wood's warped."

"Well, sonic it, use your thing!" She shouted back.

"I can't, it's wood." He countered just as loudly.

Rose reached over and pushed him back, giving the door a good kick. It moved slightly.

"Sorry, Rose." Donna said, kicking harder than Rose had and getting the door open. Tim rushed in, heading right for a book shelf, the Doctor following, and Rose and Donna moved last. The two women held the door while Tim returned with a book, stuffing it in the door handles.

It took Rose a moment to catch her breath and calm her heart rate before she realized that once the Doctor entered the room he hadn't moved from his spot nearly in the middle. Panting, Rose pushed the hair from her face and turned to see what her Time Lord was doing. He stood with his hands in his pant pockets, posture friendly.

"Hello," he said cheerfully. "Sorry about bursting in on you like this. Sorta needed to, ah, get away from a little something. Okay if we stop here for a bit?"

Rose stepped toward him, and as she did the levitating metal sphere he was talking to came into view.

"Doctor!" She shouted, rushing toward him and making to push him out of the way.

"No, no, no, no, it's alright," He said, grabbing her gently and sending waves of calm through their skin contact. He then mentally sent her an image of a Toclafane, crystal clear in his Time Lord mind, and pointed out how this was sphere was not one of them.

"What is it?" Donna asked as she and Tim came up to flank them.

The sphere suddenly dropped to the floor with a thud, rolling a little.

"Security camera," The Doctor said, letting go of Rose and kneeling down in front of it. "Switched itself off." He said as he picked it up and balanced it with one hand against his knee while he pulled out his sonic.

"Alright," Donna said, "So what was that out there? What was after us? I mean, did we just run away from a power cut?" She asked, crossing her arms and shifting her weight to better look at the Doctor.

"Possibly." The Doctor admitted.

"But it said to count the shadows, you said to stay out of them." Tim pointed toward the door as he spoke.

"That I did." He said and the little sphere made a whirring sound. "Ha, ha! Gotcha!" The Doctor exclaimed, and Rose knelt beside him to better see the sphere.

"No, stop it." Rose read the message scrolling over a small screen.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I really am." The Doctor said as he gently set the sphere down. "I'm so, so sorry."

"Why are you apologizing?" Tim asked.

"It's alive." The Doctor replied, his tone still gentle.

"You said it was a security camera." Donna protested, looking between him and the sphere.

He got back up on his feet, putting away his sonic before reaching down and offering Rose a hand she didn't take. "It is, it's an alive one."

"Hello, sweetheart," Rose said, reaching out and gently touching the side of the sphere as if to caress it. "What's your name?"

_CAL._

"Hello, CAL. I'm Rose. That's the Doctor, Donna, and Tim. We're friendly, promise. He really didn't mean to hurt you." She waited, but no other messages came up on the screen. "Can you tell us what's going on here?"

_Others are coming._

And with that, the sphere shut itself down again.

"What does it mean, 'others'?" Donna asked, the hint of panic coming through in her voice as she glanced around the room. As Donna spotted a Node, Rose finally took that offered hand from her Time Lord to get back up on her feet. "Excuse me," Donna asked the Node. "What does it mean 'others'?"

"That's barely more than a Speak-Your-Weight machine. It can't help you." The Doctor stated.

"Says the man who thought the ball was just a camera." Tim reminded as he crossed her arms.

The Doctor opened his mouth to argue, but nothing came out.

"Though makes you wonder," Donna said as she slowly approached the Node. "If these aren't supposed to more than info spots, why's it got a face?"

The Node's head turned to reveal a male. "The flesh aspect was donated by Mark Chambers on the occasion of his death." The male voice with an American accent replied.

"Oh that's fracked." Tim said. "Bad enough eyes can be donated."

"It's a real face," Donna turned to face them while pointing at the Node.

"It has been actualized individually for you from the many facial aspects saved to our extensive flesh banks. Please enjoy." The Node said with cheer.

"It chose a dead face it thought I'd like." Donna said, closing her eyes as if to collect herself. "That statue's got a dead person's face on it!" She added, clearly not calming down.

"I told you it was creepy." Rose said to the Doctor who rolled his eyes and shook his head.

"It's like I told you all those years ago, it's the 51st century! That's basically like donating a park bench."

"Hate to see the Donor cards of this century, then." Tim mumbled, glancing up and then darting forward. "Whoa, there, M.I.W." He called out grabbing Donna's hand and yanking her back.

"What ya think you're doing, Psychboy?" Donna yelled as she wrenched her hand from his grasp.

"Shadow." Tim said, and Rose felt the Doctor tense beside her, his hand tightening around hers.

He'd closed himself off entirely.

Which meant what ever was happening was scaring him in ways he didn't want her to know.

"What about it?" Donna asked.

"Count the shadows." The Doctor reminded her.

"One. There, I counted. One." Donna said, panic amping up in her voice.

"Yeah, but what's casting it?" The Doctor asked, looking up at the domed skylight, around the virtually empty room, drawing Rose's attention to every part of it. There was nothing that could cast it.

Her heart started pounding.

"Oh!" The Doctor smacked his head. "I'm thick! Look at me, I'm old and thick! Head's too full of stuff, I need a bigger head."

"No you don't," Rose tried to ease the tension, but even her heart wasn't in it as a light behind them dimmed.

"We're living a horror movie right now, aren't we?" Tim asked, his voice shaky.

"The worst kind." The Doctor said darkly.

"That shadow," Donna said, backing toward the Doctor. "It's gone."

"Gone?" Rose asked, looking around the Doctor to see it wasn't there anymore.

"Not gone, moved." The Doctor said slowly. "We need to get back to the TARDIS."

"How?" Tim asked. "You said to stay out of the shadows, and there's nothing out there  _but_  shadow."

"Reminder," The American sounding Node chimed in pleasantly. "The library has been breached. Other's are coming." It repeated, and Rose picked up a light thud coming from the barred door. She swung around, shifted, stood between the other three and what ever was about to burst through that door.

A bright, blinding light flooded over them, and a part of her was relieved for the second of seeming safety it provided in their battle against the dark. As she blinked, she made out six people in space suits coming toward them, one of them approaching her.

The person stopped, reached up and pressed a button on the suit that removed the shield, revealing the woman Rose had seen talking to Jenny at the University, though perhaps a little older.

"Hello, Rose." She said with an affectionate smile.

"Get out," The Doctor said over Rose's shoulder.

"Rude," Rose admonished half heartedly. She didn't know anything about this woman except that she knew them, knew Jenny, and if the danger here was so high that the Doctor didn't want her to know how scared he was then she did need to go. Now.

"All of you, turn around, get back in your rocket and fly away." The Doctor commanded, his eyes dark and his movements rigid and fierce. "Tell your grandchildren you came to The Library and lived, they won't believe you."

"Pop your helmets, everyone. We got breathers." The woman said to the others, and in that second relief came over Rose as she only just realized she was worried Jenny was with her.

"How do you know they're not androids?" Another woman asked as the first one removed her helmet.

"'Cause I've dated androids. They're rubbish." She flinched, peeking at Rose. "And you're going to forget that. Very important you don't remember that bit in a few decades."

"Who is this?" A heavy set man growled, storming over the the woman and glaring daggers between her and the quartet of time travelers. "You said we were the only expedition."

"I lied." The woman said with a shrug. "I'm always lying, bound to be others."

"Miss Evangelista!" The man boomed, turning toward a small, young looking brunette. "I want to see the contracts."

The girl looked stunned for a moment the nodded, jerking about before deciding where to find said contracts.

"Please," The Doctor stepped around Rose, placing a hand on the woman's shoulder. Her eyes went wide for a moment, a flash of apprehension and disappointment danced in her eyes before she blinked and it was gone. "Just leave. I'm asking you seriously, and properly, just leave." His face screwed up. "Hang on, did you say expedition?"

"My expedition," The big git said, puffing up his chest. "I funded it."

"Oh, you're not, are you?" The Doctor cringed, looking down at the curly haired woman again. "Tell me you're not archaeologists."

"Got a problem with archaeologists?" She challenged, hands on her hips.

"I'm a time traveler, I point and laugh at archaeologists." The Doctor replied in all seriousness.

The woman chuckled, shaking her head before offering her hand to him. "Professor River Song, archaeologist." She introduced herself, looking to Rose with a conspiratory grin.

"River Song, lovely name." The Doctor said, and she opened her mouth to reply but he cut her off. "As you're leaving, and you're leaving now, you need to send up a quarantine beacon. Wall the planet, the whole planet. Nobody comes here, not ever again. Not one living thing, not here, not ever." His head whipped around, and he dashed off.

"He's far more rude in this body when he's panicked, isn't he?" River commented to Rose who could only gap at the woman.

River smiled as the Doctor shouted warnings to the rest of her expedition to stay in the light and look scared. Her eyes shifted, brow furrowed before her face relaxed but her eyes filled with warning. After a moment of hesitation, Rose looked to see what River had been staring at.

Tim stood, hands in his pockets, staring down River with that glossy look he got when he was having his 'thought things'.

"Okay," The Doctor shouted. "According to Other Dave, here, the corridor is back to dark. The other one isn't much better, so! We're gong to seal up that door find another way out, all of us." He said as she returned to Rose's side.

"We're not looking for a way out." The pompous ass said, turning to the small girl. "Miss Evangelista." He commanded.

The young girl approached them with four contracts in hand. "I'm Mister Lux's personal … everything." She said and Rose cocked an eyebrow at her. She glanced to River who shook her head, and then turned to Donna who looked as disgusted as she was. "You need to sign these contacts agreeing that your individual experiences inside The Library are the intellectual property of Felman Lux Corporation."

"Ha!" Rose scoffed. " _Our_ experiences are  _his_ intellectual property?"

"Right, well," The Doctor said, he and Donna stepping forward and taking a contract each.

"You guys aren't seriously signing that?" Tim asked as they glanced them over.

As one, the two of them tore the contracts up and tossed the pieces aside.

"My family built this library, I have rights." Mister Lux said, nostrils flaring.

"Yeah, so do we. Ain't fracking using my life as your property." Tim snapped back.

"Tim, shut it," River snapped, and while Rose could see the looks of surprise on the Doctor's and Donna's faces, she noted that Tim merely raised an eyebrow in challenge. "Mister Lux, you have a mouth that won't stop. I suggest you change that, quickly." River then turned to the Doctor who snapped out of his stupor. "You think there's danger here? Real, proper danger?"

"Something came to this library and killed everything in it."

"That was a hundred years ago." River protested. "The Library's been silent for a hundred years. Whatever came here is long dead."

"Bet your life," He challenged her.

In River's eye sparked something dangerous: adventure.

"Always." She said.

The Doctor reached into his blazer, surprising Rose when he removed a torch. He flicked it on, holding River's eye until he moved to step away. "Almost every species in the Universe has an irrational fear of the dark," He said as he strode over to a shadow and got down on the floor. He laid on his stomach, and Rose knelt down beside him. "But they're wrong, 'cause it's not irrational. It's Vashta Nerada."

"What's Vashta Nerada?" Donna asked, her voice coming closer.

"It's what's in the dark," The Doctor replied. He suddenly hopped back up on his feet, looking at the expedition group. "Lights! That's what we need, lights!" He pocketed the torch. "You got lights?" He asked, and the woman who spoke to River before nodded once. "Form a circle, safe area, big as you can, lights pointing out." He instructed.

River turned to the woman who was hanging around just off to the side of her. "Anita, unpack the lights. Other Dave, make sure the door is secure then help Anita. Proper Dave, find an archive terminal. I want you to access The Library database, see what you can find about what happened a hundred years ago."

"You aren't seriously going to listen to him?" Lux asked her, pointing at the Doctor. "You aren't seriously going to take his word when it's such, such nonsense?"

"Spooky, isn't it?" The Doctor commented. "And everyone, and I do mean everyone," He said, looking pointedly at Rose. "Don't let your shadow's cross. Seriously, don't even let them touch. Any of them could be infected."

"What should we do?" Tim asked, fidgeting.

"Sit in some place with a lot of light and wait." The Doctor replied. "Once we get these guys out we're heading back in the TARDIS and leaving ourselves. Then we're going to find a warm, bright, sunny beach and staying there for a couple days."

Tim nodded without arguing, venturing toward the computer terminal with Proper Dave while Donna headed to talk to the others.

"Thanks," River said to them before she turned away and started to unpack equipment.

"For what?" The Doctor asked, glancing at Rose before following River and kneeling down where she was.

"For coming when I called."

"RS," Rose said with understanding. "River Song."

"That was you." The Doctor said with comprehension.

River smiled. "I'll admit I screwed up a little. Went farther back then I intended. Jenny's not with you, but Tim is, and so's Donna, which means it's long before …." She smiled thinly. "Best not say, I guess. Spoilers and all."

"You know us, all of us?" The Doctor asked, gesturing over his shoulder.

River's smile warmed. "Some of you much better than others." She said softly, tenderly, then glanced at Rose, and her face fell. "Not like that. God, no, never like that!" She reassured, and Rose realized that she must of let some of her suspicion show. "It's complicated."

Before Rose could ask how, a high pitched ringing echoed in the room, and the Doctor got up and ran over to the terminal.

"What is that?" Rose asked.

"It sounds like …." Donna started to say, before the Doctor cut her off.

"A phone. It's a phone."

"It started when I tried to get through into the security protocols. I was trying to call up the data core but that's the only thing I got in response."

"Let me try something." The Doctor said pounding away at the keyboard. "Okay, 'access denied', doesn't like that. Let's try something else," he did a a few more flicks on the keyboard.

"Should we see what he's up to?" River asked, looking to Rose.

"Yeah, 's probably a good idea." She replied, seeing that spark of mischief the Doctor occasionally got in far less dangerous situations.

That's when she really started to look at River the way the Doctor made her look at Jenny. She tried to see similarities between she and River, between River and the Doctor, but just couldn't find any.

So she wasn't their daughter, Rose could assume.

And River seemed quick to assure that she wasn't some sort of future mistress she'd have to worry about.

So who the bloody hell was she?

"Okay, here it comes." The Doctor mumbled, as Rose came up beside him. His eyes went wide. "Hello?"

"Hello," A little girls voice replied, and Rose craned to see a cute little brunette looking back at them. The background looked to be a living room or a playroom of some kind. "Are you in my television?"

"Well, no. I'm sorta in space." The Doctor replied, pulling on his ear. "Um, I was trying to call up the data core triple grid security processor."

The little girl blinked as if he started speaking another language, and Rose supposed to her that's exactly what the technobabble was. "Would you like to speak to my dad?" The little girl asked.

"Dad or your mum, that'd be lovely." The Doctor replied with a friendly grin.

The little girl hesitated, seeming to really take him in. "I know you," She sad. "You were in my library."

" _Your_  library?" The Doctor asked, taken aback, and Rose stepped in behind him.

The girls eyes went wide. "I know you! You're Rose." She said.

"Yes," Rose replied. "How did you know…?"

The screen cut out.

"What happened, who was that?" River asked. The Doctor didn't answer, and when he didn't River turned to Rose like it was second nature.

"I don't know," She replied honestly.

"Keep working on those lights." The Doctor said over his shoulder. There was a mumble of ascent around the room, and Rose glanced over to see that they were working.

"Doctor?" Rose asked, placing her hand over his. Radio silence lingered at first, then apologies leaked through, apprehension and uncertainty about River, and fear. More fear than there was love, which sent a shiver down her Rose's spine.

Through all of it, the Doctor continued to work, and just before he closed himself off again a twinge of frustration came over the bond.

_CAL-Access Denied._

"What's CAL?" The Doctor asked, turning toward her with a scrunched brow before his eyebrows shot up and hit his hairline. "Oh, the security sphere."

"It did say its name was CAL." Rose said.

"Are you two blatantly ignoring the books flying off the shelves?" River asked, and the two looked at her before looking around the room.

"But I like books," Rose heard Tim say as he jumped out of the way of one. "Books are my friends, come on!"

"He never changes." River sighed, shaking her head as the books seemed to stop flying off the shelves. "So, you were on to something. CAL." She said, looking between the two of them expectantly.

"Maybe it has something to do with the little girl?" The Doctor pondered out loud.

"She has to have something to do with it," Rose stated. "She recognized me, and I introduced myself to the sphere as Rose. She may not have seen who I was talking about when I gave your names."

"We could ask Mister Lux, see if he can give us any insight." River suggested with a smile.

The Doctor was up and out of his chair to find the pompous ass in a blink.

Rose almost wanted to say something to River, but the young woman was following after the Doctor. Rose, instead, opted to take the Doctor's seat, turn and watch what was happening from there.

"CAL, what is it?" The Doctor asked, and Rose saw Lux puff up his chest like it somehow meant something.

"I'm sorry, you didn't sign your personal experience contracts." He replied indigently.

The Doctor laughed, a cold, calculated laugh that signified the coming of the storm. "Mister Lux," he said with surprising calm. "Right now, you are in more danger than you've ever been in your whole life, and you're protecting a patent."

"I'm protecting my family's pride." Lux countered as if that had been the obvious reason all along.

"Funny thing, Mister Lux, I don't wanna see everyone in this room dead because some idiot thinks his pride is more important."

"Then why didn't you sign his contract?" River challenged, crossing her arms over her chest and smirking as the Doctor stared at her. "I didn't either, learned from the best after all."

"Who is she?" Donna asked as she came up behind Rose, hand on the back of the chair. "Because I've been watching, and she's, I dunno, too friendly."

"She knows us apparently." Rose replied as the Doctor and River continued to talk to Lux. "She's from our future."

"Another child?" Donna suggested. "Do ya think you two hopped off and found another machine?"

Rose shook her head. "She doesn't look like any of my family, 'cept maybe the bit of red in her hair. And she doesn't look anything like the Doctor past or now."

"What about future?" Donna asked hesitantly. "I know … well, maybe it's possible the one from Pompeii."

"No, I sorta…" Rose gestured at her head. "Sorta remember blurry images of them. Don't think that's it either."

Donna let it go for a moment as River raised her voice to Lux.

"I trust this man with my life." She snapped at the rich man. "He's one of the few constants in it."

Lux scoffed. "You've only just met him."

"No," River firmly shook her head. "He's only just met me."

"And the others?" Lux challenged.

River took a deep breath, and Rose's heart broke for the flash of pain she'd seen in the woman's eyes. "Same, for all of them."

"She said she sent her message back too far." Rose murmured as River and the Doctor started talking the history of The Library. "We're constants, how are we constants?"

Rose glanced over her shoulder to see Donna merely shrug, then caught Tim watching the whole thing while standing in the light but out of the way. He eyed River like he knew exactly who she was, but not that she was any kind of threat.

"But how can 4022 people be saved if there were no survivors?" The Doctor questioned loud enough to pull Rose's attention back to him.

"That's what we're here to find out." River said in a strange sort of Doctor-like way.

"So far we haven't found any bodies." Lux offered a small bit of help.

A scream, high and shrill, echoed through the room like it was coming from somewhere else. Rose whipped her head around, saw Donna still standing behind her, glanced to where Tim was despite knowing it was female, and then looked to the Doctor and found her self oddly relieved that River was still standing there.

The Doctor bolted, and Rose followed, the rest catching on and doing the same, causing a thunder of foot falls to echo through the empty corridor.

They came into an empty room, and Rose looked around to see the place in ruin. It seemed to be the most decayed room they'd come across which seemed off. In the middle of the room, sitting on the chair, was the only skeleton they'd seen.

Rose looked to the Doctor, his cool seeming exterior no mask to her. She could tell by his eyes, his posture, the way his respiratory bypass had kicked in, that he was terrified.

"Everybody careful. Stay in the light." He said, keeping his voice level.

"You keep saying that, but I don't see the point." Dave, proper Dave, snarked.

"Who screamed?" The Doctor asked.

Proper Dave shrugged. "Miss Evangelista."

"Where is she?" The Doctor asked.

Everyone looked around the room while the Doctor took Rose's hand. She could feel his pulse racing, could count the four beat rhythm going far too quick. He didn't have to drop his walls for her to feel his fear.

And while she knew it was there, didn't fault him for being scared of this Vasheta Nerada, she was starting to understand something that never cross her mind before: What ever was here she  _might_  survive, but he would not. And without being able to see their enemy, there was no way she could put himself between it and them.

"Miss Evangelista, please state your current …," River started to stay but stopped when she heard an echo. The Doctor pulled Rose closer, taking the torch back out of pocket and pointed it at the skeleton

A skeleton, Rose realized, wearing a suit like River's.


	21. Silence in the Library pt 2

It was easily the most fracked up thing Tim had ever experienced, and he swore if he made it out of this place alive he was writing it all down in detail so he could use it in his writing later.

The shite happening around him was horror movie enough as it was, but hearing a dead girl's consciousness continue living for a while over an intercom, asking to speak to Donna and having a bit of a conversation with her. Well, he was pretty sure this was the place nightmares were born.

Worst was that no matter how hard he tried to use his thought things he couldn't see anything beyond the curly sue who seemed to be in charge. Which, while annoyed him, at least provided him an anchor outside the messed up the scary shite that was taking place. And that helped him keep his head level when even the Time Lord and the Big Bad Wolf were starting to get edgy.

"I'm gonna need a packed lunch." The Doctor said after everyone had a few minutes to sort of collect themselves.

"Are you seriously hungry at a time like this, Doc?" He asked, arching a brow.

"Are you seriously making jokes?" River countered with a slight bitter undertone.

"River," Rose chastised, looking over her shoulder at the woman.

"I know, sorry." River apologized quickly, moving to her pack and digging through it. Rose met Tim's eye, and he arched a brow and tried not to smirk.

Oh, Wolf Girl. Her intuition was a lot stronger than she gave herself credit for, and while she didn't know what he did, she still acted on that instinct. Rose merely gave a shaky grin back while still clutching the Doctor's hand.

It's where his eyes shifted as River handed the metal box to the Doctor. They'd been clinging to each other since the lecture room, a gesture he hadn't truly seen between the couple for as long as he'd known them. Oh, sure, they've held hands as they walked about a planet they were visiting, or running from the locals they'd managed to piss off. But this was different, this was something more, and Tim could tell how much neither of them wanted to let go. They pulled apart like it was physically painful to do so in order for the Doctor to hold the lunch tin with one hand and a torch in the other while he got down on the floor and investigated the shadow.

Tim glanced around the room, spotting the most important woman in the Universe standing off to the side, watching River very carefully with a look of mistrust. Good ol' Donna, looking out for her Spaceman like a protective big sister. She caught his eye, and he smiled and winked at her, making her roll her eyes in a frustrated gesture.

He chuckled to himself, because even with all the terrifying, life threatening danger going on around them, he was Tim Latimer. He said shite to people, stuff he shouldn't know about, and he was about to do Donna a solid and annoy the crap out of the woman she clearly didn't trust.

As River sat in a chair, Tim moved to sit down in the one next to her, putting his feet up on the arm of her chair, leaning back. She glanced over, rolled her eyes, shook her head, and went back to watching the Doctor and Rose.

"So how's miss Melody?" He quietly asked with a cocky grin.

River whipped her head around and glared at him. "Don't say a word." She warned.

"Why don't you want them to know your real name? I picked it up instantly."

"Yes, well, if I remembered how young and rude you were at this stage I'd have had my shields properly raised. You'd have never gotten a peek in my head."

"Inside your head?" He raised a brow. "I'm psychic, not telepathic. Not that kind, anyway. Why do you think I got inside your head?"

"Spoilers." She snapped back without looking at him, watching the couple searching the shadows intensely.

"Spoilers, right. See, that's what I don't get," Tim said, dropping his feet to the floor with a thud and leaning in. "You know me, you know them, yet you're acting like it's the worst thing in the world for them to know anything about you. You called for them."

"I did," River cut him off sharply. "But it arrived too early. Not only do they not know me yet, they're still traveling with Donna. I should have known, right then, the moment I saw her. But I hoped…."

A flash hit Tim's mind, but he forced it out. No, no thought things on Donna, not now. He couldn't focus on both of them. He eyed River over as she watched Storm Boy and Wolf Girl, then glanced over Donna who seemed to be watching everything happening between him and River.

"So you know her, too." Tim said more quietly.

"Auntie Donna, how could I not?" River said automatically, paling a bit when she realized the slip.

"Auntie?" Tim smiled. "Oh, that's telling."

"And it's another thing you're going to keep to yourself, or I promise you I will make your life hell in your personal future."

"I don't doubt you, Pond." He said with a lazy stretch, glancing at River. She looked at him with a sad smile, like he was a fond memory, and his blood ran cold. "What?"

"You're so young." She said, shaking her head. "So very, very young that it makes your cocky attitude almost endearing."

"Better than what I thought you were gonna say." Tim admitted.

River gave a short, loud laugh. "Can't get rid of you that easy."

"Okay, we've got a live one!" The Doctor cried out. Tim looked over as the Doctor stood up, pocketed his torch, and looked around at everyone in the room "That's not darkness down those corridors, and this is not a shadow, it's a swarm." The Doctor pointed to the shadow behind him before reaching into the lunch tin River had handed him. He picked up a chicken wing, showed it to everyone, then threw it into the darkness. It was only a bone by the time it hit the floor. "A man eating swarm, piranhas of the air: the Vashta Nerada. Literally the shadows that melt the flesh. Most planets will have them, but usually in small clusters." He took a deep breath. "I've never seen an infestation on this scale, or this aggressive."

"What do you mean, most planets?" Donna asked. "Not Earth."

The Doctor shrugged in that casual way he did when he was about to say something a person may not want to hear. "Earth and a billion other worlds. Where there's meat, there's Vashta Nerada. You can see them sometimes if you look. Dust in sunbeams."

"For real?" Tim asked.

"Oh yes," The Doctor said in total seriousness. "Normally they live on road kill, but sometimes people go missing. Not everyone comes back out of the dark." He said, and Tim spared a glance at Wolf Girl who also glanced back at him with fear. How many nights had they had to camp in the woods together? Out in the open air where they thought the only risk was the Toclafane? He shuddered, now wondering how they survived at all.

"If they were on Earth, we'd know." Donna said, her tone suggesting there should be a 'dumbo' in there somewhere.

"Would you?" The Doctor spun around and took a couple steps toward her. "You humans don't know half of what's living on your planet with you, including how many people you pass in a day that aren't even supposed to be there. For centuries your own species has had ghost stories of people vanishing into thing air. Only they're not ghost stories, Donna Noble, just the cautionary tale of why you should stay out of the dark."

"And it's every shadow?" River said nervously, shifting to stand closer to Rose.

"No, but any shadow." The Doctor replied.

"So what do we do?" Rose asked firmly, her hands clenching and unclenching into fists at her sides.

"Daleks, aim for the eyestalk. Sontarans, back of the neck. Vashta Nerada, run. Just. Run." He said, scanning the room with his eyes.

"Run where?" River asked, now practically leaning against Rose.

"Well," The Doctor sighed. "This is an index point, there must be an exit teleport somewhere."

"Doctor," Donna pulled his attention. "There's a little shop back here. They always make you go through the little shop on the way out so they can sell you stuff."

It was a simple enough concept, seemingly, well, silly. But the hope lit up the Doctor's face before he dashed to press his face against the glass inside the room. "You're right! Brilliant, that's why I like the little shop." He said with utter excitement. He grabbed a floodlight and turned to to create a properly lit path to the gift shop, opened the door and flicked on the light despite the sunlight streaming through the glass ceiling. Better safe than sorry, Tim supposed.

"Alright, let's move." One of the Dave's said.

The Doctor turned, and froze. "Actually, Proper Dave, can you stay where you are for a moment?" He asked, and Rose went from confused to wide-eyed in a second. She slowly stepped around and stood half in front of the Doctor which drew River's attention. Her eyes went wide.

"I'm sorry." The Doctor said, "I'm so, so sorry, but you've got two shadows."

Tim looked. He wasn't sure he wanted to, but he did. It didn't seem threatening, just a second, slightly darker shadow next to this Dave as if a second light source was hitting him. There wasn't anything vicious about it, no soft noises or buzzing like Tim half expected to hear. Nothing more to it that he could see, but some how it was the most terrifying thing he'd ever seen.

"What do I do?" The Dave asked.

"You stay absolutely still like there's a wasp in the room. Like there's a million wasps." The Doctor instructed.

"Or one giant one with a stinger the size of your arm." Tim offered. He earned a nervous smirk from the Dave in danger.

"Where's your helmet?" The Doctor asked. "Don't point, just tell me."

"On the floor by my bag." He replied shakily, and Wolf Girl darted over and grabbed it.

"Rose, be careful. Don't cross his shadow." He warned her, and Rose paused, checked to see that their shadows weren't touching. She stepped to the front of Dave, and Tim knew without seeing that she was giving him a warm, friendly smile as she put on Dave's helmet.

"Now, the rest of you," The Doctor instructed, "helmets back on and sealed up. We'll need everything we've got."

"But Doctor, we haven't got any helmets," Donna pointed out, panic coming through in her voice.

"Yeah, but we're safe."

"I call bull shit." Tim said from where he sat, earning a glare from the Doctor.

"Yeah, I was trying offer comfort in a lie. Thanks Tim." He said, turning to River, "Professor, anything I can do with this suit?"

She took a moment to think while the big wig rambled on about the suits being useless. With a deep breath, she turned to the Doctor with confidence. "We can increase the mesh density, dial it up to four hundred percent. Make it a tougher meal." She suggested, reaching into her suit pocket.

The Doctor reached into his blazer, tossed his screwdriver to Rose. "Setting 43-a." He told her as Rose caught it and placed it over a small button in the middle of the plastic piece where the helmet attached to the suit. "Ramp up the density to eight hundred percent, then pass it on."

"No need," River said, holding up a sonic screwdriver. Looked different, more steam punk, but it had the Doctor (and Tim would guess Rose too) looking to River with wide eyes.

"What's that?" The Doctor asked stupidly.

"It's a screwdriver." River replied with a hint of amusement.

"It's sonic." The Doctor added.

"Yeah, I know." River said, the corner of her mouth turning up as she placed the blue tip to the suit. "Snap!" She said as she went about the task of upping the defenses.

"Okay, Rose, help Professor Song. Tim, Donna, come with me." The Doctor instructed, Tim got up and followed after the Time Lord who snatched up Donna's hand on his way to the gift shop.

The Doctor went to a podium like thing, and Donna started searching the desks.

"What are we doing?" She asked.

"No talking, just moving, try it." The Doctor said as she snatched Donna by the arm and dragged her up on to a platform. "Tim, stand in one of the circles next to Donna, 'kay?" He instructed as the ginger scowled at him. Tim did as he was told while the Doctor went to the door and shouted to Rose. A moment later he caught his sonic and ran back around to the podium.

"What are you doing?" Donna asked.

"Sending you back to the TARDIS." The Doctor said as he frantically moved his hands about. "Can't send the others, the Ol' girl won't recognize 'em."

"So you're sending us back to the TARDIS while you and Rose put yourselves in danger?" She raised her voice at him.

He paused in his actions, looking up at them with sad, scared eyes that didn't look right in the alien. "Yes." He said simply. "I don't have a choice. She wouldn't go even if I tried to make her."

"What makes you think we'd go so easy?" Donna challenged, no gentleness to her words, and it seemed to spur the Doctor on.

"Donna, let me explain you a thing." He said.

And then he was gone.

Teleportation was weird. It was being warm and cold at the same time, tickled all over while every single limb was asleep. It didn't last long, mere seconds, and Tim fought the urge to shudder as his body came back to him inside the TARDIS. He felt the ship's hum off relief in his mind as he and Donna returned.

Then barely had a second to feel the ship's panic before a whole new wave of sensations hit him before he was fully returned.

This one hurt, and he imagine it was what being ripped apart would feel like if it was done by a dozen serrated blades at once. He cried in agony at the same pitch as Donna's screams, and while neither were fully formed they managed to grab on to one another's hands. It wasn't solid, but the presence was there, and it was a small bit of comfort before the world went black and he wasn't sure he'd ever been alive in the first place.

* * *

 

Rose and River made quick work of the suits, the former glancing at the later as they dialed up the safety on Lux, Other Dave, and Anita.

"He's sending them away, isn't he?" River asked her.

"Yes," Rose said, seeing no reason to lie to a woman who knew their future.

She'd seen the frantic plans the Doctor had formed while they clutched to each other, mentally pep talking each other into being brave. He was a coward, a word that repeated in his mind as he tried to assess the situation, and her flight instincts were screaming at her to leave ever since seeing that chicken wing become nothing. But there were innocent people here, a woman they both figured was close to them in the future, and their two wonderful companions to worry about.

So the second Donna pointed out the shop, Rose knew exactly what the Doctor was going to do.

"You should put your helmet on, too, River." Rose said as she finished up with other Dave.

River snickered. "You're not my mother."

"I'm not?" Rose challenged.

"Rose!" The Doctor called from the little shop, and Rose turned around to see his hands outstretched. Without a thought she threw the sonic over to him, watching as he caught deftly with a wink, likely a click of his tongue, and disappeared back inside the shop.

She turned back to River, waiting for an answer.

She seemed to have lost some of her resolve. "No, you aren't my mother." She said quietly. "But you are someone so very, very important to me."

"And the Doctor?" Rose asked.

River's eyes flickered over to the little shop. "Yes," She hesitated. "But …."

"Not  _this_  Doctor." Rose nodded, and River did as well.

"Umm," Proper Dave got their attention. "Only got one shadow now."

Rose looked around him, turned to the equally wide-eyed River, then both turned to the little shop. "Doctor!" They shouted in unison, and the man appeared a few seconds later. "His second shadow." Rose pointed to the floor, and the Doctor's eyes followed, brow furrowed as he craned his head to look around.

"Where did it go?" He wondered out loud.

"It's just gone," Proper Dave said gleefully. "I looked around, one shadow!"

"Does this mean we can leave?" River asked the Doctor.

"I don't know why we're still here." Lux grumbled. "We can leave him, can't we? I mean, no offense."

"Shut up, Mister Lux." River snapped.

"Proper Dave, did you feel anything? Energy transfer, crawling on your skin, anything?"

"No," Proper Dave replied, stuttering on the word like he wasn't really sure it was the truth. "But, look, it's gone." He said, starting to turn.

"Stop there! Stop, stop, stop." The Doctor snapped, causing everyone to still. "Stop moving. They're never just gone, and they never give up." He said through clenched teeth as he got down on his knees slowly, with drawing his sonic and pointing it at the shadow Dave still had. "This one's benign."

"Okay," Rose half breathed a sigh of relief. "So what happened to the other?"

"Could have moved back to the shadows, I suppose." The Doctor mumbled, glancing around at the various castings on the floor.

"Hey, who turned out the lights?" Proper Dave snapped.

Rose looked to the Doctor again, his eyes wide as he met hers. He swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing as he slowly stood up. "No one, they're fine." He said in a steady voice.

"No, seriously, turn them back on. I can't see a ruddy thing." Proper Dave insisted.

The Doctor side stepped, reaching for Rose's hand and grasping it tightly.

" _Can you see inside his helmet?"_  He asked through their bond. She took a deep breath, looked to where Dave's face should be, and felt her heart stutter. Rose shook her head, unable to pull her eyes away from the dark shadow behind the visor. "Dave," he said out loud, side stepping closer to Rose. "I want you to stay absolutely still, got it?" He asked the man in the suit who stiffened at his words. He gave no reply. "Dave? Dave, can you hear me? You alright?"

"I'm fine. I'm okay, I'm fine." The man lied terribly. "Why can't I? I-I can't .. Why can't I?" He started repeating.

"He's gone." River said quietly. "He's ghosting." She pointed to the communicator light on the suit, and Rose noticed how they were blinking. She wasn't really close to the Miss Evanglista's remains when they discovered her ghosting in the other room, but she noted the light on her suit blinking. Dave's was going the same.

"He can't be gone, he's still standing?" Lux said as if they were the idiots in the room.

"Oi, you pompous ass, listen to me," Rose turned around, stepped toward him and gave him a good shove that had him half screaming and looking behind him. "A man died, and we are trying to make sure the rest of you don't follow 'im. You wanna think we're stupid and question everything we do, have on ya. But do us a favor and keep it to yourself, mate. Because I'll warn ya right now, I am terrified. And do you have any idea what happens to a wolf when they get cornered? They get vicious, and you don't want to be the focus if I snap, ya got that?"

"Wolf?" Lux smirked. Rose gave him another firm shove and turned back to the Doctor as he was stepping closer to Proper Dave.

"Doctor, what are you?" Rose started asking when the hand of the still-standing suit went up and wrapped around the Doctor's neck, forcing him down to his knees.

"Oi!" Rose yelled, charging after the suit.

"Rose," River called, flashing her screwdriver before giving it a toss. Rose caught it, pressed it to the suit, and the second the Doctor was released she shoved him backward and away. Tossing River back her screwdriver, she shifted to stand between them and the suit as it started forward awkwardly.

"Doesn't move very fast." River noted with some relief.

"It's a swarm in a suit, but it's learning." The Doctor said, catching his breath from the shock.

The suit paused, and four dark shadows slowly started to spill out for it.

"We've got to move!" Rose said over the babbling Lux.

"Duck!" River commanded, withdrawing a blaster and pointing it to the closest wall. Much like Jack had done for them all those years ago, River's gun created a doorway where there wasn't one before, opening into an adjacent room.

"Squareness gun!" The Doctor shouted happily.

"Loving that thing more, and more." Rose said as she headed for it. "Best way to escape the walking dead."

They entered the room and stopped. The pathway ahead had light shadows ahead, and with the suit coming closer, there wouldn't be time to scan them all.

"You said not every shadow." River noted.

"But any shadow." The Doctor confirmed.

Oh this could hurt, this could be the worst feeling ever. Would she even live? It ate all flesh, including the brain, so what would bring her back? But then again, she survived bombs and fires.

Turning, Rose grabbed the Doctor's face and placed a firm kiss on his lips. "Give me a few seconds head start. I drop, you know it's not safe."

"Rose, no," He tried to say, but she turned and bolted before he could argue. A few seconds later, she heard the rest following her through the maze of bookshelves. She didn't stop until she came to an information kiosk, a small one compared to the others with only one Node behind a small desk and hardly enough room for the six of them to stand comfortable. There was a light overhead, and that, at least gave her some comfort.

A moment later, they all rounded the corner, and the first thing the Doctor did was pull her into a tight embrace and kiss her forehead.

"You're going to give me a hearts attack pulling something that reckless." He half panted.

"Odds were good I'd live." She said into his neck, feeling his relief and love pour over her like a balm for all the negative that weighed on her.

"Yeah, but I can't imagine the agony you'd be in." He said, kissing her forehead again before getting up on the desk and pulling out his sonic. He grabbed the lamp by the shade and pointed the screwdriver at it, the light slowly growing brighter.

"What ya doing?" Rose asked.

"Trying to boost the power." He replied, concentrating on the task. "Light doesn't stop them, but it slows them down."

River came up beside her, pointed her own sonic screwdriver toward the light, and with a quick whir it got brighter. The Doctor looked down at her with a scowl, but she just smiled sweetly.

"So what's the plan?" She asked innocently, looking between him and Rose. "Do we have a plan?"

The Doctor hopped off the desk. "Your screwdriver looks a lot like mine." The Doctor pointed out.

"Yeah, you gave it to me." River said with a shrug.

"I don't give my screwdriver to anyone." He said with vehemence.

"And you still don't." River said, stopping Rose from chastising the Doctor for his rudeness. "Rose being the exception, of course. But I asked very, very nicely to have one for my birthday, and after nearly eighty years of begging you finally said yes."

The Doctor's face fell, and Rose cleared her throat.

"Eighty years?" She repeated. "How old …?"

"A lady doesn't reveal her age when she looks as good as we do. You taught me that." River said with a wink before turning to the Doctor. "So, plan?"

"Get out alive somehow." He huffed. "I teleported Tim and Donna back to the TARDIS. If we don't get back there in under five hours, Emergency Program One will activate, and the TARDIS will give them the information they'll need to get which ever one is stranded back home." He explained.

"Information?" Rose asked, and the Doctor turned to look at her with guilt in his eyes. "Whaddya mean by that?"

The Doctor swallowed. "Been a long time since I've traveled with multiple people, especially those who aren't from the same place. We're lucky Tim and Donna are from the same year. I set up an account in both Canada and England while you three were sleeping just after the Vespiform incident. In the event that they get sent home, the TARDIS will choose the safest landing spot, and she'll give them what will be needed to get the stranded one home." He reached out, brushed her cheek, sending apologies only to flinch back.

Because Rose wagered he wasn't expecting her to have appreciated the gesture so much. And as much as she was sure neither Donna nor Tim would have been happy with being sent away, she knew it was for the best. Even if she couldn't admit the Doctor had the same intentions all those years ago.

He gapped, his jaw flapping about, and then nodded once and turned back to River. Unable to look at the mystery before him for long, he then looked down at his screwdriver and frowned.

"Huh." He said.

"What is it?" River asked.

The Doctor looked hesitant to say something but relented. "They aren't there. I should have received a signal when the teleport breached."

"Maybe the coordinates have slipped? The equipment here is ancient." River suggested, glancing at Rose and looking for just a moment like a scared little girl wanting her Mum.

"Donna Noble," the Doctor shouted, and Rose whipped her head around to see him looking at the back of a NODE head. "There's a Donna Noble somewhere in the library with a Timothy Latimer. Do you have the software to locate them?"

The NODE swiveled around, and Rose's stomach flopped.

Donna's face stared blankly back at the Doctor. "Donna Noble has left the library, Donna Noble has been saved. Timothy Latimer has left the Library. Timothy Latimer has been saved." It said in a perfect rendition of Donna's voice.


	22. Forest of the Dead

Tim sat on a hospital bed and looked around the room. It looked homey enough, a few personal touches here and there. A couple of his favorite books sat on the bedside table, there were a couple get well and birthday cards kicking around. He was in his favorite pajama bottoms and t-shirt, and on his lap was a moleskin journal and an expensive pen. Things he didn't think he owned but had wanted to for quite some time.

A knock on the door drew his attention, and he looked up first at the smooth, shiny head of the man in a sharp suit before he looked into the man's eyes. He always hated rimless glasses, what was the point? You were still wearing glasses so who cared if they had frames? Tim shook his head a tiny bit, before smiling at the man who's name suddenly came to him.

"Hey, Doctor Moon." He greeted.

"Good morning, Tim. It's a lovely day, shall we go for a walk?"

A blink later that's what they were doing.

"How the hell did we get out here?" Tim asked, looking around at the beautiful trees just off the paved path, the white stone benches resting beneath small groves of them. There were other patients walking around, but none her recognized.

Which he felt like he should, because he felt like maybe he'd been here a while. But then again, it felt like he'd been here for a few seconds as well.

"We walked down the stairs and out the back door," Doctor Moon replied with a smile. "We passed by Miss Jane, you told her she was looking exceptionally hot today. She told you to shove it."

Tim considered this. It made sense. "Right, yeah. Forgot.

"And then you remembered." Doctor Moon said with a slow nod. "Has writing down the dreams helped? Are you able to tell fiction from reality now?"

Tim looked down at the moleskin notebook he didn't realize he'd been carrying but had been all a long.

"Yeah," He replied.

"So you are understanding now that the Doctor and the Wolf Girl aren't real?"

"Not real." He repeated.

"Good."

He was suddenly at a desk in a small apartment that looked really familiar and yet, wasn't. Confused at first, the knock on the door had him up and out of the chair like he'd been expecting it. He opened the door to find a smiling Doctor Moon on the other side.

"Hey, Doc." He said, stepping aside and letting him in.

What exactly was he seeing this guy for again? He didn't know.

"I heard congratulations are in order." Doctor Moon said as he made his way over to the sofa. "Writing down all those dreams are leading to a promising career as a writer.

Tim looked down in his hands and saw the contract. The five book deal with a five figure advance that was totally unheard of in this day and age, but seemed perfectly normal to him somehow. What was more, while he had no idea when or where he was, but he didn't seem to be bothered by it as much as he was sure he should have.

"Yeah, yeah." He said, giving a cursory glance over the CAL publishing house form. There were words, but he couldn't read them. Yet, he knew what they said.

He glanced up, and in place of doctor Moon was Rose.

"Wolf Girl?" He arched a brow, but then she was gone, and he shook his head.

Doctor Moon stood there, looking at him.

"Hey, Doc," Tim greeted him again, wondering briefly how he had his contact in his hands but didn't pay it any mind.

* * *

 

"Okay, we've got a clear spot," River said after using her squareness gun and making an entry to another reading room. The skylight above their head showed the sun preparing to set but was sitting in such a way above them to allow few shadows to be cast in the red-washed room.

The first thing the Doctor did when they were inside was take his sonic out and scan the shadows that did exist while River gave instructions to her crew to use the lights they brought to chase them away.

"Any word from the TARDIS on Tim or Donna?" Rose asked, already knowing the answer. The Doctor looked over, shook his head, and then continued scanning.

Rose nodded, the numbness hardly backing off to allow anything in. She wanted to scream, cry, rage, throw herself into a live shadow just to  _feel_  after losing her friends but she couldn't. Oddly, it was like she was suddenly aware how empty her head was even though neither of them had ever really occupied it, and she had a new empathy for the Doctor post-war.

The Node with Donna's face kept repeating itself until they were chased away by the moving suit, and they ran until River managed to find them this space. She didn't dare ask the Node she saw in this room about Tim, not wanting to see his face or hear his accent portrayed back to her by a machine.

"Have you found a live one?" River asked the Doctor, pulling Rose's attention back to the present, to the people she hadn't failed to protect yet.

The Doctor beat his screwdriver against his palm. "Maybe, it's getting harder to tell." He grumbled before cursing at the tool.

"We're gonna need a chicken leg. Who's got one?" River asked the crew. The remaining Dave shrugged off his pack, reached in, and handed River his lunch tin. "Thanks, Dave." River said as she opened it up, took the leg out, and flung it into the shadow.

It was nothing but bone before hitting the ground.

"Lovely," Rose grumbled.

"They won't attack until there's enough of them." The Doctor said, offering a split second of hope before adding, "But they've got our scent now, they're coming."

"Tell me there's  _something_  we can do." Rose asked him in a whisper, coming up and standing next to him as he tried another shadow. He glanced at her with regret before turning back to the shadow with intense concentration.

Hesitantly, and partly curious, Rose stuck her hand in it.

She hissed, with drawing it quickly, staring at the little hole left in her hand where her body's healing rapidly made up for the infinitesimal parasites trying to strip her flesh. She felt the Doctor's eyes on her, and she looked over her shoulder to see him staring at the hand, watching the flesh regenerate before his eyes before sending her a glare of the oncoming storm.

"Why?" He asked.

She shrugged. "Wanted to see what'd happen. Had to know if I could act as bait."

"Don't." He said, slow and menacing. "I already lost Donna, Tim. Don't make me lose you, too."

She nodded, giving him this one.

But that pain, for a moment, was beautiful. So she still had emotions, feeling, that was good. Maybe that mean they'd get out of here.

"What's wrong?" River asked, coming up to them and looking first to the Doctor, then to Rose. Her eyes fell to the way Rose was holding her hand, then she looked to the Doctor's sonic. "Still having trouble with it?" She asked, seeming to avoid asking why there were a bunch of tiny scars healing quickly on Rose's hand.

"There's a signal coming from somewhere interfering with it." He said, holding up the sonic for River to see.

"Use the red settings." She shrugged.

"It doesn't have a red setting," The Doctor replied.

"Well use the dampers." River retorted, gesturing to the tool.

"It doesn't have dampers!" The Doctor replied frustrated.

"It will do one day," River said, taking out her screwdriver and admiring it like a prized possession.

"So in the future I just give you a screwdriver? Something I haven't even considered making for the woman who is practically my wife?" He stepped forward, turning his Oncoming storm look down on River. She flinched, but not in the way most do, more like someone who was about to be told off instead of threatened. "Why would I do that?"

"Because you knew how much I wanted one." River replied.

"Not good enough, give me another reason." He countered harshly.

"Doctor." Rose said softly.

"No," He stopped, looking over at her without changing his glare. "No, we have lost two people we hold very dear, two people that are like siblings to us. I want to know why, after losing them, we should trust the woman who sent us the call that brought us here. I want answers, ones I know you tried getting already, but enough is enough." He then turned sharply back to River. "Now, you. You are going to tell me  _exactly_  why we should trust you when everything that's happened so far is leading me to believe this may have been some kind of trap."

The room was painfully silent, and Rose glanced between the fierce looking Doctor and the torn, chastised looking River. She pocketed her sonic, then rung her hands like a child getting in trouble with her parents, looking at her fingers as she seemed to try and draw some sort of conclusion.

She took a deep breath. "One day I'm going to be someone you'd give your life for." She started, lifting her chin and looking him in the eye. "Rose, too. And where this is … so early in your life, I wouldn't have done this other wise. But I  _need_  you to trust me, and I can't wait for you to come to the conclusion I'm safe. So," She then said a word, or maybe it was multiple words, that sounded a lot like a melody.

What ever she said, it was Gallifreyan. And what ever the word or words were, they made the Doctor pale. His brow furrowed in confusion before glancing at Rose then looking River over as if cataloging her.

"Are we good?" River asked.

"Is there another … term … you would use?" He asked, choking out the words. "For someone else in the room, I mean."

River glanced over at Rose, a smile in her eyes. She said another word or group of words, and something hit Rose in the heart. It wasn't the same warmth she felt when the Doctor said words of endearment to her in his language, it was something very close to what she felt for Jenny.

"Now are we good?" River asked him.

"Yeah, yeah, we're good."

"Good," River said, smiling through tears before she turned away.

The Doctor looked to Rose, and she could see the shift inside him.

He grinned ever so slightly before something in him snapped. "Know what's interesting about my screwdriver?" He suddenly said, launching into speech mode. River looked up, her shoulders sagging in relief. "Very hard to interfere with, practically nothing strong enough. Well, maybe a some hair dryers," He said, shooting Rose a glance with a raised eyebrow that made her roll her eyes. "But I'm working on that. So, there is a very strong signal coming from somewhere, and it wasn't there before. So what's new, what's changed?" He asked, looking at everyone in the room. "Come on, what's different?" He asked when no one said anything.

"I dunno, nothing. It's getting dark." Dave replied with shrug.

The Doctor rolled his head toward him. "It's a screwdriver, it works in the dark."

"It's a screwdriver that doesn't do wood, it's safe to question it's usefulness in the dark." Rose defended the poor guy.

"It's sonic." The Doctor said to her as a defense. "Has a little blue light in the end, think that would make it obvious."

"Yes, and it's a screwdriver, a tool used for assembling furniture which is usually made of wood." Rose glanced to River. "Does it work on wood in the future?"

She grinned. "Nope."

"Maybe that's something you should work on then?" Rose countered. "Do it some night while I'm sleeping and you're not."

The Doctor's eyes widened. "Night." He said, looking up. "Moon." He said a little louder, a little more eager. He turned to Lux. "Tell me about the moon, what's there?" He asked the ass who wouldn't tell them anything before.

He stood, looking to the Doctor with confusion. "It's not a real moon. It was built as part of The Library it's just a doctor moon."

"What's a doctor moon?" The Doctor asked with growing urgency.

"A virus checker. It supports and maintains the main computer at the core of the planet." Lux replied.

The Doctor pressed a button on his sonic, looking at the readings. "Well, it's still active. It's signaling, look," He said, showing the scans to Lux. "Someone, somewhere in this library is alive and communicating with the moon. I'm blocking it, but it's trying to break through."

"Doctor," River said, pointing behind him.

But Rose didn't look, because flickering in front of her, just a few feet behind River, stood Tim. He arched a brow, mouthed his nick name for her, and then he was gone.

"That was Donna!" River pointed out.

"And Tim was behind you," The Doctor added. "Maybe we can get them back. If I can find another wavelength…."

"Professor." Anita's shaky voice cut him off, and Rose turned toward the woman as River and the Doctor did.

Her heart sank.

"Two shadows." Rose said with resignation. "They've found us."

"Helmet's back on everyone." River said with a shaky voice.

"I'll get Anita's," Rose said, careful not to cross shadows with anyone as she maneuvered her way over to Anita's helmet on the floor.

"Didn't do Proper Dave any good." Anita said as tears streamed down her cheeks.

"No," Rose said gently. "But you're not Proper Dave, are you?" She grinned as much as she could as she placed Anita's helmet on her head.

"Rose," the Doctor said, gesturing with his sonic before he tossed it to her. She pressed the diode to the suit, and the helmet screen went black. Rose jumped back, arms out to the side and coming in contact with River as she pushed her back.

"They've got inside." River choked out.

"No, no, her visors tinted." He explained. "Changed the settings on the sonic before tossing it to Rose. Maybe they'll think they're already in there and leave her alone."

"You think they could be fooled like that?" River asked as she and Rose turned toward the Time Lord.

He shrugged, looking at his feet. "Maybe, I don't know. It's a swarm, it's not like we chat." He looked around the room, lifting his head a little, moving more slowly, then came to stand next to Rose. Sides flushed together, holding her close to him with a hand to her shoulder, thumb against her neck, she could feel his tension both physically and through their touch.

" _One, two, three, four, five, six … seven."_ He counted frantically in his mind while wearing a mask of calm. "River, could you come here please?" He asked, gesturing with his head.

"What is it?" She asked, seeming much more relaxed now.

"How many people still alive?" He asked.

"Six," She replied automatically. "Why, have they got Anita?"

"No, she should still be alright. But I want you to count the people in this room."

"Why?" She asked nervously.

"Just do it." He said gently.

River glanced around the room. "Seven." She said softly. "Seven people."

"Hey! Who turned out the lights?" Proper Dave's ghosted voice cut through the quiet.

"Run!" The Doctor commanded, shifting his hand to clutch Rose's as they ran from the room. The swarm in a suit followed, albeit at a more unsteady pace.

" _Talk to it,"_ The Doctor rambled in his mind, his thoughts loud enough to leak through the link between he and Rose. " _Maybe I can convince it to leave us alone. Let us get out of here. Though need to figure out where Donna went. Tim too. Get the others away first. Why, why, why?"_

Rose pulled him to a stop in the middle of the skyway, forcing him to look at her.

"You aren't seriously considering?" She asked in a low, hushed tone as the others ran past, River stopping a few feet away from him.

"I am." He responded in an equally low voice. "It's a long shot, I know, but I've got to try. I've got to find out why they chose to hunt here. And maybe, just maybe, I can convince them to leave us be."

"Hey, who turned out the lights?" Came from the other end of the skyway, and Rose looked over to see the skeletal face of what used to be Dave peering through the half tinted visor as they suit sauntered toward them slowly.

"Doctor, Rose." River tried to hurry them along behind her.

The Doctor gave her a glance, his eyes softening. "Go, I'll be fine. Protect River." He said out loud. " _Trap door beneath my feet,_ " He said in their minds. " _I can feel it, change in density and the like."_

"Doctor," Rose argued weakly, nervously watching the suit come closer. "If you are one second too late."

"I won't be." He grabbed her shoulders, holding her eye. "This is one time when I need to handle the situation without worrying about you getting hurt, or her …." He took a steadying breath. "She said a word. One word in my language. What I hope will be  _our_  language. And that word changed your instincts toward her just like protecting Jenny cemented your maternal one with our daughter. Follow them, Rose, because if she can say that word to me than she's absolutely right, she  _is_  someone we would die for."

Rose took a deep breath. "Just don't make it today, yeah?"

"Of course not, it'd be a paradox." He said with confidence. "Now go."

Rose nodded, turned, and grabbed River's hand before pulling her along.

"Dave, stay with him. Make sure he knows when it's time to run." She said as they passed by with barely a glance at him. Dave didn't argue, and maybe that was because it was clear that River was in charge, but after they'd put enough distance between Dave and themselves, Rose gave River's hand a squeeze.

"The Doctor has a plan, he'd have escaped in time." Rose said with confidence that she didn't really feel. "So why did you leave Dave with him when we both know he didn't want anyone there with him."

River stopped, looking ahead where Anita and Lux were continuing on with a healthy distance between each other, then over her shoulder to where they left the Doctor.

"Because he had two shadows." She said calmly, her eyes glistening. "And Anita having two, it's a liability I couldn't risk. You might live, Lux wouldn't."

"And you?" Rose challenged.

"I don't want to find out." River replied honestly.

"What do you mean?" Rose asked.

River sighed, a shudder to her breath. "Spoilers." She said, barely above a whisper, and Rose didn't press.

She squeezed River's hand before giving it a tug and moving them along.

* * *

 

This was the kind of life Tim had always dreamed about. Writing, telling stories for a living, but there was something missing. Something he couldn't put his finger on. He looked around his apartment, knowing it was too quiet, feeling almost as though there was something missing. He should hear things, see things, he knows. He thinks, anyway. Why? What's missing?

He's at a party, a lavish book launch which is absurd for a first time author. He knows this, but he doesn't care. Large prints of the cover for  _Wolf and Storm_  are hanging on the walls, a pile of hard copies stacked in the middle for party guests to take. There's a woman on each of his arms, both blond, both far too intelligent to be hanging around a guy like him, but he doesn't care. He swears he's seen this before, like maybe on a TV show, but he's not sure.

Just like he's not sure how he got to this party, or wound up with a glass of champagne and posing with some brunette for a Facebook picture. Where did the blondes go?

A woman dressed in black from head to toe, a veil covering her face, walks past him. She slipped something in his pocket, and when he turned to see where she went she was lost in the crowd.

Pulling the paper out of his pocket, he hands his champagne glass over to someone else. He doesn't know who, or when someone was suddenly there beside him, but he didn't mind. Unfolding the paper, he read:  _The world is wrong. Meet me at the park by your place. A woman you'll recognize will be there. 2pm tomorrow._

He looked up to see himself standing in the park, a laptop bag slung over his shoulder, his dress clothes traded for casual wear. He was about ten feet away from a park bench, and the woman in the veil was sitting next to a red head who stared at him like she was trying to place him.

And what's more was he knew in his gut that she was familiar.

"So you say the world is wrong," Tim said as he came up and sat on the side opposite the veiled woman than the redhead. "How so?"

"It's a fantasy world."

The redhead scoffed. "I'm running ragged with a set of twins and a husband who works Monday to Friday, usually not home until after the kids go to bed. How is that a fantasy life?"

"Because it is what you always wanted." The veiled woman replied. "You always wanted the perfect family life. That is never as we see it, and you were aware of that when you were uploaded, hence, the life you live now. As for you," She turned to Tim. "You didn't know what you wanted in your life, only that you wanted acceptance, belonging. That is why your life seems more extreme, more dreamlike."

Tim opened his mouth to argue, but stopped. Because this was the dream, after all. To write. To have too many fans, and too many people wanting to be his friend. As if on cue he heard his mobile chime a bunch of times in a row. He itched to read the messages, but a little voice in the back of his head, one that felt like it had been forced into silence screamed at him to not to.

"Your voice," The redhead, Donna, said. Yes, he remembered now. Her name was Donna Noble and she was the most … something. The most something that he couldn't remember. "I recognize your voice." She said to the veiled woman.

"Yes you do." The veiled woman said with pride, and maybe a little relief. "I am what is left of Miss Evanglista."

* * *

 

They had found relative safety in another reading room, and while Lux was preoccupied, and Anita's back facing away, Rose made to test the shadow with her hand.

"You do that and he'll murder you." River said, a little amused and a little wistful. "I do know that. Years later, and he will always hate that you'll let yourself get hurt for the sake of others, even if your fearlessness makes him proud."

She took out her sonic, pointed it at the shadows, and let it's whir fill the temporary silence.

"What's he like? In the future?" Rose asked, and River's lips pursed around the coming word. "I've met him." Rose cut her off with barely more than the "sp" of spoilers making their auditory presence. "Future him, well, hims. I've met them. I barely remember what they looked like, or sounded like, but I do remember them and I just want to know what kind of man he is. As much as you  _can_  tell me. 'Cause you look at me and you seem to see just that: me. But when you look at him …."

"He is different." River said, softly at first. "Right now I see you two still grappling with your need to protect each other, but in the future you are … or you are so much more of a team. He loves you now, and it's very evident, but you two become such a fierce presence in the universe. The Oncoming Storm and his Beautiful Bad Wolf, the stuff of legends. You are revered as much as you are feared, and when your task is done the two of you swagger off back to your TARDIS that opens it's doors at the snap of your finger. The Doctor and Rose, in the TARDIS - next stop: everywhere."

"Spoilers," The Doctor's voice came from behind, causing both women to spin around with wide smiles. He smirked from the top of a set steps that led to a wide ledge that moved with the book cases. He climbed down a few before jumping over the railing, walking a few steps toward them. "Nobody can open a TARDIS by snapping their fingers. Doesn't work like that."

"Does for you." River countered.

The Doctor snorted, shaking his head before moving carefully over to Anita. "How are you doing?"

"Fine, I guess."

The Doctor glanced down, likely noting how she still had two shadows. "Tinting the visor must make a difference."

"It's making a difference alright. No one's ever gonna see my face again." Anita attempted to joke, and the Doctor smiled sadly.

"Can I get you anything?" he asked.

"An old age would be nice."

"Try my best," he said as he went to turn away.

"Doctor." Anita grabbed his attention again. "When we first met you, you didn't trust Professor Song. Then she said something, or at sang it maybe, I don't know. But she said it, and you did. What did she say?" He glanced at his feet, then to River, then to Rose. "You can whisper it if you don't want your girlfriend to hear. You know, if it's that bad. I'm gonna die anyway, so your secrets are safe with me."

Rose watched his eyes grow wide, realization washing away everything else in that moment. "Safe." He softly. "Safe, you don't say saved. Nobody says saved, you say safe."

"What is it?" Rose asked, coming up to his side.

He took her hand, showing her what happened with the Vasheta Nerada first. She heard the voices of tiny parasites speaking as one, explaining that they were born there. That the books were their trees. What followed were apologies and promises to make it up to her somehow as the memory of hanging on the beam with the taste of the metal from his sonic came through came through. Before she could dwell too much on that, he showed her a brief glimpse of what he thought might be happening, and she smiled despite being utterly pissed at him.

"If that's it, if that's the case."

"Then Donna and Tim are in the library.  _Saved._ Lux!" He called the man's attention, darting over to the poor, baffled looking soul. "The data fragment, what did it say?"

"4022 people saved. No survivors." He repeated, looking at Rose and River in a way that seemed to ask for help.

"Ha ha, brilliant!" The Doctor exclaimed, his grin manic, eyes wide with joy for the first time since landing on The Library.

"Doctor?" River asked, confused more than anything.

"Nobody says saved." He explained. "You say safe! It didn't mean that 4022 people were safe, it meant they were literally saved!" He then dashed over to a computer terminal, typing furiously.

"What are you looking for?" Rose asked.

"Proof." He said. "And there it is, see?" he said, and Rose watched as a what looked like a steady reading of some kind suddenly flared before dying down again. "A hundred years ago, massive power surge. All the teleports going at once. Soon as the Vashta Nerada hit their hatching cycle, they attack. Someone hits the alarm, the computer tried to teleport everyone out."

"Except they couldn't go anywhere, yeah?" Rose said, her brain slowly starting to hum in that way that calculated things without her trying, the light headache forming behind her eyes. "So it saved them to … oh, you said the core of the planet was a computer."

"With the biggest hard drive in history." He confirmed, turning and cupping her cheek with a thumb on her temple. Rose was already getting the speed and power of her mind under control, the headache subsiding, but his cool touch both physically and mentally eased it a little more. "And when the computer uploaded all those people with nowhere safe to send them, what did it do? It  _saved_  them." He said, glancing to River who beamed proudly.

An alarm blared around them, and the Doctor turned back to the computer, hissing from the abrupt pull from Rose's mind. She felt it just as keenly, thankfully not a pain she had experienced often but it was enough to get the headache to return for a moment.

" _Auto-Destruct enabled in twenty-minutes_."

"Oh, bloody hell," Rose groaned, half clutching her head as she watched River stand next to the Doctor as they looked at the computer terminal together.

"What's maximum erasure?" She asked the Doctor.

"Twenty-minutes, this planet's gonna crack like an egg." The Doctor said, pulling out his sonic and preparing to do something to the terminal.

"No, it's alright." Lux said, and for the first time since meeting him Rose could see honesty in his eyes. "The doctor moon'll stop it. It's designed to protect CAL."

A moment later the computer shut down entirely.

"No, no, no, no, no!" The Doctor half yelled, pulling at his hair a moment before he used the rail of the nearby steps as leverage and hopped up on top of the terminal. Sonic out, he tried some from above while River knelt down at the base.

" _All Library systems are permanently offline. Sorry for the inconvenience._ "

Rose whirled around, looked to Lux, and cleared the distance between them in a few short moments. "CAL is a security system, yeah? She's sentient, knows and understands what's going on 'round her?"

Lux nodded hesitantly. "She should."

"So why is it shutting down? After saving 4024 people, why would she shut down the computers that are storing them?"

"I don't know." He admitted sadly. "But we need to get to the main computer to find out."

"It's at the core of the planet." The Doctor said from behind her, the sound of his shoes hitting the floor punctuating his sentence.

"Well then," River said. "Let's go."

Rose heard a hum of a screwdriver before turning and nearly being blinded by the unexpected blue light.

"Gravity platform." River said.

"You think you're so impressive." Rose teased her as everyone in the room stepped onto the circular platform.

"I am so impressive." River countered. "I was taught to be by the best."

"I see why I like you." The Doctor smirked down to River.

"Of course you like me." She said before the platform descended to the core of the planet.

* * *

 

They decided to circle the playground. Tim didn't quite know why, only that it seemed to make sense for them to do so.

"Why are we here? Of all places, why a playground?"

"Because it's the easiest place to see the lie." Evangelista explained.

"What lie? Donna asked.

"The children, look at the children." Evangelista insisted.

So he did. Tim looked around and saw it. Because Donna had got her children's attention before they got up to walk, or at least he was sure he knew which two were hers. But now. Well, they all looked alike, even their clothing matched.

But if Donna noticed, she didn't say anything about it.

"Why do you wear that veil?" She asked instead. "If I had a face like yours, I wouldn't hide it."

"You remember my face, then!" Evangelista said happily. "The memories are all still there. The Library, the Doctor, me."

"Wolf Girl." Tim said. "And River. I even think I saw Rose once but … I'm not sure."

"You're been programmed not to look, not to remember your real life." Evangelista explained.

"But you died." Donna said, her brow knitted in confusion.

"In a way, we're all dead here." She countered. "We are the dead of The Library."

"Great," Tim drew out the word. "'Cause I haven't died enough times in my life." He said. But had he died? Yes, by Toclafane. No, no that wasn't real. Was it? Yes. No. Oh his head started to hurt, too many things trying to break through. Tim collapsed on his knees, clutching his head. He'd died, he did, but he didn't.

"It's worse for you." Evangelista's voice wasn't gentle, but it wasn't unfriendly. It was simply stating a fact. "You have the burden of two sets of memories. Extra suppression. You haven't had a vision once since being here. You know that you should have had at least one, but nothing has happened."

Tim threw his head back, catching his breath as he sat on his heels. He looked up, catching a glimpse of Evangelista's severely distorted face behind the veil. He only stared, he couldn't think of anything to say on it, and then the pain in his head came back, and he had to shut his eyes against the world.

When he opened his eyes, he was alone with Evangelista on a park bench. The playground before them was empty, and it was night time.

"What happened?" he asked, the pain in his head gone. "Where'd Donna go?"

"I have given her the information she needed, she has chosen to continue to care for children that do no exist. You, Tim, you understand that this isn't real, don't you?"

"I don't know." He admitted. "I know this is all surreal, my life here. It's what I wanted for so long, but … I don't know. Something's off. I know it is. You say we're saved data?"

"Yes." She said factually. "It can be actualized when you or the Library require it."

"And how will I know? No, how is it possible?" He asked.

"When you were teleported, before you could be fully actualized, CAL drew you in."

"CAL?" Tim asked, knowing he'd heard the name before.

"It's the only word floating in the data core that seems to belong to nothing. A name without an owner, I believe it's the computer."

The night sky turned dark red above them, and Tim and Evangelista calmly looked at the portion over their heads.

"I suppose this is when actual death happens." He mumbled.

"Perhaps." Evangelista said without emotion.

He nodded. Tim didn't know what to say. He had nothing to lose by dying. Not really, not that he could think of. Brown eyes and blonde hair flashed in his mind, but it didn't seem real. Just an image, a fleeting bit of something that his mind feebly tried to call upon and cling to.

Not a big deal, of course. The same thing happened the last time he died.

* * *

 

They arrived in the data core, and it reminded Rose very much of what she would expect being inside a computer would be like. All wires, and panels of circuitry, a giant glowing something over their heads that drew the Doctor's attention most of all.

"The data core," He said. "Over 4000 living minds trapped inside it."

"They won't be living much longer if we can't figure out a way to get them out." River noted as she dashed over to a computer terminal. The Doctor threw on his specs and joined her, the two quickly calling up something on the monitors.

"Help me," A little girl's voice whimpered. "Please help me."

"What was that?" Rose asked River, then turned to the tormented looking Lux. "Mister Lux?" He bowed his head, moving toward a panel off to the side of the room.

"The computer's in sleep mode." The Doctor noted as he continued to type furiously. "I can't wake it up."

"Doctor, is it me, or do these readings …." River trailed off.

"Yeah," He said, sounding confused. "It's like the computer is dreaming."

"It is," Lux said, pulling off his gloves. "Dreaming of a normal life, and a lovely dad, and of every book ever written."

"Computers don't dream." Anita protested.

"No," Lux resigned. "But little girls do." He opened the panel he'd been standing next to and flipped some kind of switch. Rose turned toward the wall that was opening behind her, the little girl's cries for help growing louder. As Lux ran over to the Node revealed to be in the room, it's head turned to reveal the life-like face of a little girl no older than seven.

"Hello, sweetheart." Rose said softly as she stepped toward the Node. The little girl's eyes met hers, eyebrows lifting.

"You're Rose." She said simply.

"That's the little girl, the one we saw on the computer." Anita said, her voice betraying her panic of her recognition.

"She  _is_  the computer, in a way." Lux explained, lifting his hand and gently stroking the girl's cheek. "The main command node. This is CAL."

"CAL is a child?" The Doctor snapped. "A child hooked up to a mainframe. Why didn't you tell me this?"

"Because she's family," Lux snapped back. "Charlotte Abigal Lux, my grandfather's youngest daughter. She was dying, so he built her a library and put her living mind inside, with a moon to watch over her, and all of human history to pass the time. Any era to live in, any book to read."

"A childhood forever." Rose understood, putting her hand on what would be the Node's shoulder. Charlotte looked down at her with a small smile, as if she felt the comforting gesture. "Filled with wonder and imagination."

"What every child deserves," Lux nodded.

"So you weren't protecting a patent, you were protecting her." The Doctor said with his own, reluctant understanding. "But then the shadows came."

"Shadows!" Charlotte startled. "I have to … I have to save."

"You did, darling." Rose said with her most encouraging smile. "You saved everyone."

"Why didn't she tell us before? Right from the beginning?" Anita asked, frustrated.

"Because she forgot." The Doctor said, and Rose felt his hand on her shoulder. "She's got over 4000 living minds chatting away in her head. It must be …."

"So what do we do?" River asked before the Doctor could say anything more.

"Easy!" The Doctor said, hand leaving Rose's shoulder. She turned from Charlotte to watch him. "We beam all the people out of the data core, the computer will reset and stop the countdown." He said, typing manically. "Difficult, Charlotte doesn't have enough memory space left to make the transfer. Oh, come on, big brain of mine, think!"

As the Doctor hit his palm firmly against his forehead, Rose looked to Anita. She noticed something very wrong, very quickly, and her breath caught.

"River," Rose called to the Professor who worried her lip with her teeth, seeming deep in thought. "Get Mister Lux here to the nearest telepod."

She nodded once, gesturing for Lux to follow her which he did after one last stroke of Charlotte's cheek.

"What about the Vashta Nerada?" The suit asked, and Rose moved slowly, casually, pausing at the Doctor's side to grip his hand.

" _Count the shadows._ " She whispered in his mind.

" _Already did._ " He confirmed darkly, and Rose made to casually stand with her arms folded between him and the suit, leaning against a support beam as she looked to the suit.

"These are their forests," The Doctor said with a shrug before returning to the computer, typing away. "I'm gonna seal Charlotte inside her little world, and take everybody else away. The shadows can swarm to their hearts' content."

"You think they're just gonna let us go?" Anita's voice asked, and Rose snorted.

"Best offer they're gonna get." The Doctor replied bitterly.

"You're gonna make them an offer?" The voice asked incredulously.

"And they'd better take it, 'cause right now I'm finding it very hard to make any kind of offer at all. Because I really liked Anita, she was brave, she never gave in, and you ate her." He reached in his blazer and withdrew his sonic and pointed it at the suit, removing the tint from the visor and revealing Anita's skeleton.

But Rose's brain kicked into gear the second she'd looked at that lovely blue diode, and she'd barely been able to pay attention to the Doctor and the Vashta Nerada as her brain calculated the possibilities.

"How long have you known?" The swarm asked.

"Counted the shadows. You only have one. Now," He said, stepping slightly away from the terminal, screwdriver still in hand. Oh, oh it would work, she knew it would. Was sure it would.

Maybe.

"I'm giving you back your forests, but you are giving me them." The Doctor said. "You are letting everyone in here go."

"These are our forests, and they are our meat."

She felt it. Rose didn't have to look down to see she had two shadows now. There was a prickle at her feet, and she remembered the pain that small exposure caused earlier. She remembered the way her flesh looked as it regenerated at a slower rate than the swarm could eat. Meeting the Doctor's terrified eyes, the sight of them were quickly blurred by the tears filling her eyes. This was going to hurt more than any other death yet. Her hand still ached as it was.

"Don't. Play. Games. With me." The Doctor bit out. "You just killed someone I like, and now you are threatening the woman I love. That is not a safe place to stand."

"She will feel nothing." It said, and Rose closed her eyes in an effort to steady her breath. It would be any second now.

"You have no idea what she would feel, but I'm telling you right now that if you so much as take a nibble of her flesh it will be your fatal mistake. I am the Doctor, you are in the biggest library in the universe. Look me up."

Rose didn't have a time sense, but she felt every precious second of the next few moments tick by as her body quivered with tension and hot, salty tears ran down her face. She breathed, as best she could, wishing for the first time in years for the Doctor to save her.

She felt the withdraw of the shadow like a blast of cold air, her eyes popping open to see the Doctor slowly lift his chin.

"You have one day." The swarm said, and then she heard the suit fall to the ground behind her.

"Rose!" He ran toward her, pulling her to him in a crushing embrace reminiscent of the one he gave her when she hadn't fallen into the void. "Are you alright, did they attack you at all?"

She could only manage to shake her head, gripping his jacket by the lapels and breathing him in deeply. He touched the back of her neck, soothing her, calming her from inside her mind, pressed his lips to her hair as they heard footsteps coming toward them.

"Anita!" River's voice cried out.

"I"m sorry, she's been dead a while now." The Doctor said as he let go of Rose and went back to the computer.

"What happened?" River asked, looking between the Doctor and Rose.

"Let's just say that this would be the part we'd swagger back to the TARDIS," Rose said with a smile.

"Not quite yet." The Doctor said with a growl. We still only have a few minutes before the auto-destruct, and the only way I can think of is to use my brain to give Charlotte the extra memory."

"Another suicide mission." Rose growled. "Didn't we just talk about this a couple months ago?"

"Rose," He growled.

"Shut it," Rose snapped back. "Your sonic. Mighty powerful tool, that. Lots of settings on there, thousands, most you don't use. Imagine that has to have a lot of memory, yeah?"

He looked down at the screwdriver in his hand, eyebrows lifting a moment before frustration came over. "It has memory, lots of memory. But I'd need, oh, twice the amount for it to give a clean download."

"Well then," Rose said, "Good thing you each have one." She looked pointedly at River who took her own tool out of her suit pocket and stared at it.

"No!" She said, the realization making her bitter as she glared at the Doctor. "No, you … for my … and you  _knew!_  Oh I'm so telling...," she paused, looking to Rose. "Actually that explains the slap you gave him, and the very firm looking conversation you two had over your bond."

"Oh, good to know we at least bond in the next eighty years." Rose teased.

"I'm about to sacrifice my beloved screwdriver, can we please not start  _that_  right now?"

"Oh, hush up, you can make another one." Rose growled before turning to River. "And I promise, right now, that he will give you another one."

"Good." River said as she handed her screwdriver over to the Doctor.

He worked quickly, opening a panel on the wall and wiping the setting off both screwdrivers. He dug around in his pockets, pulling the sonic pen the once belonged to the Matron and used it to help secure the screwdrivers in place.

"Oh," River cooed. "That's sleek."

"It's yours. Happy Birthday, or whatever." The Doctor said, inspecting his work then turning to Charlotte. "There, how's that?" He asked with a brilliant smile as he handed the pen over to River.

Charlotte giggled, her smile stretching, and the countdown stopped.

* * *

 

They walked into the reception room, just off of where they'd parked the TARDIS, and was pleased to see the majority of the 4000 people that were saved to the DATA core that day now boarding shuttles to leave the planet. A PA message kept relaying instructions, but Rose ignored it all as she, the Doctor, and River all wound their way through the crowd, the two former hand in hand. Making it to the edge of the crowd, they spotted Donna and Tim standing near the corridor leading to where the time ship waited.

The second their eyes met, Tim dropped his foot from where it had rested against the wall, and Rose noted Donna uncrossing her arms. Five wide smiles broke out, and as Tim ran for Rose, Donna ran for the Doctor. Each pair hugged each other tightly, laughing hysterically before changing partners and repeating the process all over again.

"I can honestly not tell you how good it is to see your face." River said as she and Tim hugged. She had closed her eyes once in his arms, but a moment later they flew open. "Which means you've known all this time that there would be a day when I would say it."

"Guess so," He said, looking like he was going to add something else but stopped himself. River then hugged Donna, all the same affection and relief she had for Tim in that embrace.

"All these people will be cleared off the planet long before the Vashta Nerada would be free to hunt again." The Doctor said, looking around at the people waiting in line for teleport.

"And what about after?" River asked as the Doctor turned around and headed for the TARDIS. "What happens then?"

"A warning goes out." The Doctor replied. "People will know that coming here might mean never going home. There will always be adventurers out there who want to risk life and limb, literally, for the sake of saying 'I was there'."

"But not us." Rose asked with a smirk.

"Oh, definitely not us." He said with confidence before pausing. He turned to River. "Am I right?" He asked.

She grinned. "Spoilers."

"You know, you're kinda rude. Where did you pick up that from?" He asked, turning and walking backward a couple steps.

She laughed, her whole face lighting up with the smile. "Oh you already know." She replied.

The Doctor said nothing, turning back around and stopping a few feet away from the TARDIS. He seemed to consider it, looking to Rose and holding her eye as he lifted his right hand. He glanced at the time ship, then snapped his fingers.

Rose's jaw dropped when the doors actually opened, and the Doctor grinned like a loon.

"Told you." River said, strutting past them and heading inside.

The rest were quick to follow, and Rose found it strange to see the Professor looking around the interior with wonder.

"Oh, look at you," She cooed. "I've never seen you like this."

"Seriously?" Rose asked as she moved to the console with the Doctor.

River shook her head, eyes searching and falling on something beneath the panel. "Is … is that a hand?"

"Yep, it's my handy spare hand." The Doctor replied gleefully before his face fell. "Wait, I don't have my spare hand in the future?"

"No," River said bluntly.

"Oh," he said with disappointment. "Oh well, must have found a reason to use it. Or put it away." He shrugged. "Anyway, where should we drop you off, professor?"

"Allow me," She said, moving to the console and expertly putting in the coordinates she needed, flicking a couple switches. River then looked up, glancing between Rose and the Doctor with a smirk. "Yes?" She asked.

"Nothing." The Doctor said, flipping the switch and starting the engines.

Rose watched River smile lovingly at the ceiling, caught waves of the affection returned from the ship, and when they landed it was far more gentle than normal.

A knock on the outside of the doors startled Rose, and she looked to the Doctor when she distinctly heard Jack on the other side say, "Oh Rosie! Come on out."

"Back away from the doors, Jack." River shouted back. She then looked to the Doctor. "Spoilers," She said with a wink before running around the console and down the ramp. She paused with her hand on the door, turning around. "Thank you," She said sincerely. "For coming when I called, just like you always will." And with that, she opened the ships doors as much as needed to slip back outside.

Without another word, the Doctor and Rose put them back in the vortex.

"So tell me," Donna said from where she sat next to Tim on the jumpseat. "Who'd she turn out to be? Do you know?"

The Doctor and Rose walked around the console in unison, standing next to one another. He glanced at Rose, grasping her hand. " _Do you want to know?_ "

" _What makes you think I don't already?"_ She countered with a grin.

The Doctor nodded. "Exactly? No. But after you two were saved, she said a Gallifreyan word that one would call an unrelated male who took on a more fatherly role. Often times it was a teacher, but on occasion it was not." He took a deep breath, brow furrowing. "And she used the female version in regards to Rose."

"So you're her … what? Step Dad? No, like adoptive Dad?" Tim suggested.

"I'm her father figure." The Doctor replied.

"Maybe she and Jenny are best mates in the future." Donna suggested. "I thought I'd seen a girl who looked a lot like her when we dropped Jenny off at school, maybe that's all there is."

"Maybe," The Doctor said doubtfully. "I think it's something more. Has to be. No way I would  _give_  a screwdriver to one of Jenny's friends for her birthday, no matter how much she asked, or what I  _knew_  she'd need it for. I think that maybe there's something deeper there. That term, that word, there's no English equivalent, but it wasn't used lightly."

"And then she knew the word." Rose said bluntly, getting confused gazes from Tim and Donna. "She spoke Gallifreyan. Can't even do that myself, only understand a few words."

"Well, she's a mystery." The Doctor said with a sigh. "And not one we need to know right now. We'll figure it all out in time. Always do." He smiled. "How about a good ol' cuppa tea and a nibble in the galley? Talk about where we should head off to next."

"I remember someone saying something about a beach." Donna said as she got to her feet, poking the Doctor in the chest. "And after the day I've had, I expect a beach.

The Doctor peered into Donna's eyes, and she looked back with a glossy gaze. "You alright?" He asked, knowing the answer.

"I'm always alright." Donna replied, and the Doctor dropped Rose's hand to put his arm around Donna's shoulders as they headed down to the galley.

"I know who River is," Tim said once the Doctor was gone. "If you want to know."

"I don't." Rose replied. "Not 'til he does."

Tim nodded, his eyes unfocusing as he looked to Rose's feet. "You alright too, Wolf girl?" He asked knowingly.

"Yeah," Rose lied. "Yeah, I'm alright."

Tim nodded, taking Rose's hand and walked slowly in the same direction as Donna and the Doctor.

They would all have nightmares tonight, Rose knew that. They all went through hell, looked death or pain or both in the eye and survived. But those were a few hours off.

For now, the four of them would sit around a small dining table, chatting about things that would make them smile or laugh, and ignore their personal pain for as long as they could.


	23. A Pauper as a Princess pt 1

She stood in front of the mass collective of alien natives with their pale skin, and blonde hair. Their pale eyes, a rainbow of colors, all watched her stand on the raised dais while her heart pounded in her chest. Her left hand had been made to clutch that of Lord Thornon, and the few glances she'd managed to steal of him gave some comfort in that he didn't want this any more than she had. They had already said words that neither meant, hollow and empty promises to spend eternity with one another even though this was not her home and she did not love him. But kisses did not seal these words or pronounce them husband and wife, this was a ceremony for a princess. A wedding culminating in a coronation where heavy crowns placed on heads would mark that 'to death do us part' was officially put in place with no chance of divorce.

She watched out of the corner of her eye as the lesser of the power couple was given his small crown, and how Thornon swallowed deep enough that his adam's apple bobbed visibly. He cast his eyes down as the crown hovered over his head, closing them in resignation as it rested against his hair.

Her heart beat faster, fear coming over her, a tear slipping down her cheek as she sensed the priest behind her, sensed the crown coming near her head. She wanted to scream, protest, but found she couldn't. She trusted the Doctor to have found a way to get her out of this, but he didn't come through, not this time. And now she would never see him again.

She would never see the Doctor.

She would never see Tim.

She would never see Rose.

Donna Noble wanted a good husband, a good life, and to never have to worry about anything ever again. She did not want that husband to be an alien, no matter how gorgeous he was. She did not want that good life to involve castles and servants, though it had been fun to pretend. And she certainly didn't want to be a Queen, not like this.

The crown was getting closer to her head, and she felt the humming of energy coming off of it that would seal the deal of the marriage, the coronation, the chance at never coming home,

"Stop!" Her eyes shot up to the temple doors, watching as the Doctor in his rumpled brown suit, Rose in her soldier clothes, and Tim in his noblemen wear walked into the temple with confidence. Behind them was a familiar figure with now red hair walking behind them. "We found her," The Doctor said in a commanding voice. "The real Schala, we found her. So let our friend go."

Two days earlier.

The TARDIS landed with its usual shudder, and Rose stepped outside the doors hand in hand with the Doctor. The air was cool, crisp, and the sun shone over them and burned away the last of the fog. The grass beneath their feet was green, the sky above blue. Birds chirped and early morning song, and the trees of the nearby forest looked like pine. All in all, Rose would have bet they were on Earth if she couldn't notice the change in the air and gravity.

"Where the heck are we?" Tim asked as he stepped out behind them, he and Donna taking their usual places at Rose's and the Doctor's sides respectively.

"No idea." The Doctor admitted. "But that's the thing about random, never know where you'll end up. Oh, it could be Earth, or the planet Midnight, or even Raxacoricofallapatorious, it's always a surprise."

"Yeah, well, last time you set it to random we almost got killed. Twice." Donna reminded the Doctor with cheeky snark.

"I never repeat the same adventure twice." The Doctor said, lifting his chin and giving a slight, indignant sniff.

"We went to Satellite 5 twice," Rose reminded him as they all started to walk forward, putting the woods and the TARDIS at their backs.

"You said you and Rose had already been to Rome," Donna added as they started to climb a hill.

"And let's not forget that the first time we met it was because of aliens at the school." Tim reminded, and Donna chuckled with Rose as the Doctor grew more flustered.

"Yes, well, a visit back to Satellite 5 was not my choice, we ended up in Pompeii, and the first time I was human, doesn't count." He pouted as they got to the top.

No one said anything else as they took in the landscape. There was a large, beautiful castle made of white stone with teal roofing in the distance to the right, a large brown mountain as its back drop. A high wall surrounded it, and there were carts and people coming and going, which caused Rose's gaze to pan left. She could see puffs of smoke in the distance, a brownish dot beneath them that indicated a village. It seemed the land around them was cleared for the most part, slopping here and there and with the off single tree of grove dotting the landscape.

"Blimey this is beautiful." Donna noted, nearly breathless.

"It's like … kinda like a fairy tail." Tim noted. "Like something out of a movie or a game."

"And you have no idea where we are?" Rose asked the Doctor, looking up at him as he looked around with a wide grin and eyes alight.

"Not a one." He said, looking down at her. "But I'd love to find out." He said, giving her hand a tug. "Allons-y!" He added, jerking his head down the hill where he walked gracefully while the others half stumble to fight the run gravity wanted them to take.

They headed toward the castle, music catching Rose's ear as they got closer.

The people, she could see of those both coming and going, all looked the same. Blonde hair, worn long, with high foreheads, and heart shaped hairlines. They were all pale, as if none of them had seen the sun despite there being two in the sky above them. All dressed relatively medieval, with most of the women in long, intricately embroidered dresses, and the men in tunics over snug fitting trousers with knee-high boots. And of those whose eyes she managed to see, they were varied shades of pale pink, yellow, green, orange, and blue.

The animals pulling the carts looked like horses, but their manes and tails were of various colors like the people's eyes. Their eyes also looked like they were much more intelligent than an Earth horse, some catching and holding her eye. Many looked away instantly, others held her eye like a challenge.

"I'm on drugs, right?" Tim asked as they let the heavy traffic flow in front of them, rubbing his right temple a little.

"Nope," The Doctor said, popping the p as he took his hand out of Rose's and put both in his pockets. "'Cause now that I've seen the natives I know precisely where we are. The planet Namtier, a beautiful, peaceful matriarch planet where I'm not going to be imprisoned simply for being a man."

"Seriously, that happens?" Tim asked.

"More times than you'd think." Rose said with a sigh. "So why do you say that? A peaceful matriarch? Is it because the men aren't treated like slaves?"

"Partially." The Doctor replied with a shrug. "The men of this planet aren't quite equal to the women but they have free-will. But it's like a flip to the ideals that were long held on Earth. Women are the head of the household, they gain the inheritance of the family and decide how it falls. Titles are given to the daughters, earned by men through marriage or in the event of something extraordinary. Children can be born out of wedlock and considered legitimate because they came from their mother's womb. Hard to dispute parentage that way."

"So if, say, Henry the eighth had lived here?" Donna started to ask.

"Oh, if Henry the eighth lived here, his life would have been far different. For instance, he'd have been passed over for the throne in favor of his sisters. Had he still taken power, Mary would have been celebrated. Also, Catherine would have held the power instead of him even if she was from another land. Happens here, as well. Princesses from one of the other three parts could marry a prince here and rule the region. Also, Henry wouldn't have had the right to divorce Catherine, and if anyone from the Boleyn family was going to try and worm their way in to the royal family it would have been George. Well, maybe Ann, but that wouldn't have helped much for procreation."

"What the frack are you talking about?" Tim asked.

"Did someone miss giving you the birds and the bees talk, there, Psychboy?" Donna teased.

"Probably have had more experience with the birds and the bees over the last year than you have M.I.W." He quipped back. Donna's jaw dropped and she scowled at him as he pinched the bridge of his nose rubbed at his tear ducts. "I meant who the frack is Henry the eighth?"

"Don't they teach you history?" Donna asked.

"Yeah, but there wasn't any Henry in it that I remember." He replied.

"King in sixteenth century England." The Doctor answer, and Rose noticed that he seemed to take note of something. "Doesn't matter. My point was Namtier is one of the most peacefully run planets in this Galaxy. They are a gentle people until they are threatened with war, and then those who dare just how powerful they are. And," He drew out the word. "We are off worlders, so we are drawing an awful lot of attention."

Rose looked back at the people coming and going, only just noticing that the people had all but stopped the flow passing over the lowered draw bridge. Guards had stepped forward, not in a threatening way, but cautiously curious. There was a soft murmur, and out of habit more than instinct, Rose took a couple steps in front of the Doctor and the others, waving for Donna to stand closer to the Time Lord.

Without warning, a group of people all dressed in teal tunics and white, snug trousers, knee high black books came rushing out over the draw bridge toward them. The crowd had parted, though there was little alarm.

Rose waited, noting how the people, likely soldiers or guards, were all arms but baring none of them. They stared at the group, eyes filled with wonder, and didn't move.

"What's going on?" Tim asked in a whisper.

"No idea." The Doctor said cautiously.

Another wave of people came, though this time they were surrounding a woman with hair more white than blonde, long and flowing down her back with a simple gold crown resting atop her head. Her dress was elegant yet simple, dark blue with bell sleeves and a slight train to the skirt.

Directly ahead of her was a lovely looking guard who wore a gold sash crossing over the belt strapping her scabbard in her back. Her eyes were a vivid orange, fierce and authoritative. She did not bow as everyone else had.

As the royal woman approached them, she stepped right past Rose and moved for Donna. She circled her slowly, looking her up and down while Donna looked on in confusion, glancing at the Doctor and Rose for a sign that maybe it was safe to speak. Both gave tiny shakes of their heads, not sure what was happening and not wanting to give anything away.

When the woman stopped before Donna again, Rose could see her pink eyes glistening as she reached up and cupped Donna's face. "You're home." She said with a shaky voice.

"Sorry?" Donna asked, moving her head as best she could in the woman's grip.

"You've come back to me, just as they it was foretold. My daughter. My sweet, precious daughter. What did they call you? What name were you given?"

"Ah," Donna said, her eyes still wide. "My name's Donna. Donna Noble."

The woman laughed as if she couldn't believe it. "Oh, but of course. A clue that would lead you to back to me."

"I'm sorry, your majesty," The Doctor said, seeming to take a stab in the dark at the title and stepped toward Donna. "But we, clearly, are not from these parts and are all, frankly, quite lost. Would you mind, perhaps, filling us in. Why, for instance, do you believe Donna is your daughter?"

The woman took a long look at the Doctor as if to study him, then glanced and met Rose's eye. "You're the one who brought her back?"

"More of the co-polite, me. And even then I usually let him have all the fun." She said with a gesture in the Doctor's direction.

"But you have protected Schala. Donna, I mean. Haven't you? You kept her safe?"

"Been known to." Rose nodded.

"Then we must get you in appropriate attire, all of you, actually." She said, smiling warmly at the Doctor despite having ignored him, and Tim who seemed to think it wise to stay quiet.

"Queen Gwendolyn, I must protest," The woman with the gold sash spoke up immediately, her voice light and youthful despite her mannerisms.

"Elda, I appreciate what you will say, but I am Queen, and I say that they are all welcomed guests at the castle." She then turned her attentions to another young, female guard. "Run ahead and tell them that I order Schala's rooms be prepared, as well as three other guest rooms."

"Oh, just two." The Doctor said, earning his first glare from Queen Gwendolyn. "I don't mean to undermine your word." He said quickly, bowing slightly and bring his hands together in front of his chest as if he was about to pray. And maybe he was, to any Deity that would listen that this wouldn't lead to him being locked up. "It's just that I would feel more comfortable remaining in my own clothes, and I don't require much sleep, if any. I would prefer to stay with my partner."

Gwendolyn glanced at the Tim. "A little unorthodox, but alright. You and your young man may stay together." She assented, nodding to the guard to amend the orders.

"She thinks we're gay." Tim said very quietly, sounding shell shocked. "She thinks we're a couple. I'm not entirely sure if I should be flattered that she thinks I could actually get a guy like you, or offended that I don't come off as some kind of womanizer."

"In this land, let's just keep Gwendolyn thinking what she'd like." The Doctor said as Gwendolyn turned toward the palace, clutching Donna's arm to ensure she would follow.

"Does this mean I get the bed entirely to myself?" Rose asked cheekily as they followed, Elda positioning herself between the Queen and them, the other guards bringing up the rear. They continued to bump Tim into her, and she could hear his slight grumble each time their hands brushed.

The Doctor clutched her hand. "Tim snores. I can hear him when I go out to tinker in the console room when you're sleeping." He said with a slight grin.

"You've told me I snore, too." Rose reminded him as they were lead over the draw bridge and through the village nestled inside the walls.

"Yes, but yours are adorable. His sound like a saw ripping through metal."

"I can sorta hear you, you know." Tim said, causing both the Doctor and Rose to stop and stare at him. The guards behind them halted as well, but when they started fidgeting uncomfortably, the trio started moving again. "Don't worry, that's not normal. I know when you're talking in your heads because there's like this, I dunno, hum in my ears like when they ring only not. But that? Seriously? A saw? All the sounds in the universe and that's the best you can think of."

"How the hell can you hear us? We're bonded!"

"Fracked if I know." Tim said with a shrug.

* * *

 

"I swear, if you ask her, she will let me in her room." Rose heard the Doctor argue with the guards outside her room. She grinned, having heard him get increasingly louder and more frustrated by the second, but pretended not to hear just to see what would happen.

A timid knock sounded on the door, and a moment later one of the young, pretty guards posted at her door stepped inside. "Lady Rose, there is a man outside the door who wishes to enter."

"He may," Rose said as she continued to sort through the garments on the bed, the lot having been brought to her room just moments before the Doctor had arrived seeking entry.

"But my lady, you are not yet changed." The guard said, baffled by the idea.

Rose smirked at the girl who looked no older than a teenager. "He's my lover, nothing he hasn't seen countless times before." She said with ease. The girl blushed, looked at the ring on Rose's finger but said nothing. With a nod, the girl stepped back outside, gesturing for the Doctor to step in.

He straightened his tie as he shot an glare of annoyance at the guard before smiling to Rose. "Hello, Sweetheart." He said as if they hadn't seen each other all day. "Oh, look at you. Special uniform, hmm?"

"Apparently, I am thought to be Donna's protector, and am therefore to be dressed in gold instead of teal." She said as she pulled her black jumper off over her head to pull on the loose fitting shirt sleeves. She paused when she she got it over her head, looking at the tunic once more before turning to the Doctor. "Gold. Bit 'Bad Wolf' isn't it?"

The Doctor picked up the garment as Rose shimmied out of her jeans to pull on the thick, white tights. He considered it. "Suppose if you wanted to look at it that way, but really I think it's just the color of the East."

"East?" Rose asked as she took the sleeveless garment from the Doctor.

"Yes, Namtier has four realms, South, West, North, and East." He replied, his eyes following the movement of her dressing.

"Seriously?" She asked as she pulled her hair out from beneath her clothes before she started pulling the lacings tight in the front.

"Told you lots of planets have a North," He said with a cheeky grin before coming around and taking over the task of tying her in. "We are in the East. Pale skin, hair, eyes, that's East. North they're all blue tinted up there. Some visitors to the planet think it's a permanent side affect for the more chilled weather, but in reality that was just the way of the people. Hardly ever snows up there, actually, just a preconceived notion of all things North. Anyway, the South everyone's more orangy in their skin tone, dark hair, dark eyes. And the West is all earth toned. Brown skin, green eyes, tan hair. Really, the people of this planet are gorgeous for most part, with very few exceptions."

"Are they?" Rose asked, arching a brow and causing the Doctor to blanch.

"Well, they, they are if you are, umm, interested in the, ah, physical appearance of a humanoid." He said, pulling on his earlobe. "Personally, me, I, uh, well, I prefer a pink and yellow variety." He cleared his throat.

"So you're saying Jack would have a field day." Rose teased, giving the Doctor an out, and he smiled up at her.

"That he would." The Doctor agreed as he returned his hand to tie the tightened lace. "But their physiology also stirs a lot of questions in my mind, some that hopefully Queen Gwendolyn will answer for us. Do you have any idea where Tim had been taken?"

Another knock on the door, and the same guard from before came in, looking exasperated. "My lady, there's another young man here."

"Let him in." Rose said, and the guard stepped aside to allow Tim entry.

His tunic was navy, odd in contrast to the colors she had seen others wearing. His trousers were black, but his boots were still the brown she had seen everyone else wearing.

He fidgeted as he walked, hands making a motion as if he was going to stuff them in his jacket pocket, his eyes slightly clouded.

He looked around Rose's room as she sat on her bed and pulled on her own boots. "Not too shabby," He noted as he came and sat down next to Rose. "So how are we going to break it to the Queen that we are not the three prophesied travelers who bring her daughter home? 'Cause, you know, Donna's not her daughter."

"Umm," Rose said, looking to the Doctor.

"Why do you think there's a prophecy of some sort going on here?" The Doctor asked, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

Tim tapped his head by his temple.

"Thought thing?" Rose asked as she stood up.

"Nope, heard a voice in my head. Kinda like when I heard you two earlier. Just snippets of conversation." He said with a shrug.

"Okay that, that, right there, is wrong." The Doctor said, pointing at Tim in frantic gestures. "You're psychic, not telepathic. Certainly not more than Rose. How? How can you be hearing anything? Okay, alright, let's try something."

"Seriously?" Tim asked as he got to his feet, adjusting his tunic.

"Humor me." The Doctor said in a half snap. "Now, can you hear me?" He asked, staring straight at Tim with intensity.

Tim narrowed his eyes, focusing. "Kinda sorta." He said, rubbing at his temples. "It's mostly just, I dunno, grumbling." He paused, then looked at the Doctor as if he'd been insulted. "Hey! I pull off a tunic just fine, thank you. And maybe you should look in the mirror next time you say I have chicken legs."

The Doctor chuckled.

"So he's telepathic?" Rose asked.

"Still low level," The Doctor said, hands back in his pockets. "Had to really yell with my mind for him to hear me. Oh well, another mystery to figure out. But first, let's head down and find out what's going on with Donna."

* * *

 

Donna smoothed the bodice of her dress for the dozenth time despite the smooth, satin like texture not really needing it. The jewel-toned purple was regal, rich, and not something she would have picked out herself, but her handmaids (handmaids, how bloody wizard was that?) had insisted that it would contrast her hair. Which they insisted remain down as was the custom of the East. On her head was a thin circlet of gold, something she tried very hard not to touch, but felt nice on her head. Every girl wanted to be a princess at some point, and what woman didn't want to be treated like one?

But that only raised more questions, and as she was led by four female guards in teal to the Queen's personal sitting room she wanted to blurt every single one of them. Like why they hell they thought she was their princess, and what did it matter at this point? Thirty was likely the expiration date for most things, including marriage and to a prince, so why was it such a big deal that she had been in theory, brought home?

She was led to the door and waved inside, though the guards made no move to follow her inside.

The Doctor, Rose, and Tim were already inside waiting, two of them having changed into the local fair. They rose when she walked into the room, but likely only because Queen Gwendolyn did so.

She rushed over, clasping Donna's hands as she had outside. She peered into Donna's eyes with such hope, but after a few seconds it fell away to acceptance, and she stepped back to look at the others who remained standing.

"She honestly doesn't know who she is?" Gwendolyn asked.

They all exchanged a glance.

"With all due respect, your majesty," Rose said with a bow. "None of us know why you think Donna is your lost princess."

Gwendolyn looked them over carefully, stepping away from Donna to meet Rose's gaze.

"It seems the legend was sparse on the details for a reason. Please, be seated, and I shall explain to you everything." Gwendolyn said with a nod to the divan they had been grouped together on before turning back to Donna. Gwendolyn smiled wistfully as she gestured for Donna to sit in the large, plush chair next to hers.

She did, managing to catch the Doctor's eye and send him as much of a comforting smile as she could before he turned away.

Gwendolyn sat in a contemplative state before raising her chin and taking a commanding posture that drew the attention of everyone in the room.

"Some three decades ago, Namtier was under less peaceful times. In all our history, it is one of the few where the threat of war among the regions was felt. South and West had a few grievances against the North, and our region was seen as aiding them. When it all started I had been pregnant. Twins, a double blessing given to me to help establish my very new reign. I was considered … passive by many in my region as we tried our best to stay neutral through the striff instead of siding. An heir was enough to ensure that my throne wouldn't pass on to a cousin, but two was a solid foundation.

"The off worlder who fathered them was a fantastic man, a wonderful man unlike anyone I had met, and I had asked if he would share my throne with me. It was a week afterward that his body was found on the shoreline. I could never prove who had actually committed the crime, it could have been as simple as thieves after his wares or credits, but regardless. It was seen by my advisors' as a threat. He may have been a man but my fondness for him was my weakness and it seemed it was more than just my region that knew it. I gave birth two weeks later, but to a son as well as a daughter. A daughter with brilliant orange hair." Gwendolyn looked over affectionately at Donna, who could only smile back weakly.

"It was shortly after the birth of my children," Gwendolyn continued, "that an attempt on my life had happened. The assassin was one of my own, but many speculated she was paid off from one of the other countries. What's more, had she not been stopped as quickly as she had been it had come to light before her execution that she was also after my Schala."

"You sent her away." The Doctor concluded.

A tear escaped Gwendolyn's eye, but she remained stoic otherwise. "Yes." She said simply. "I was approached by a commoner in the village on a day I was holding court. She had told me that she foresaw my perfect daughter, with her flame colored hair and the eyes of her father, being a wise woman who will do what's right for her region. She would have fantastic influence over the planet's politics, and usher in a new way of life. But to ensure her destiny be fulfilled I had to send her away. Threats on her life would continuously occur, and because she was so distinct from that of her people it would be impossible to hide her. So I was to send her away, and she would be returned to me, to the region, and to the throne, on the first moonless night after her thirty-first birthday by three off-worlders as her father had been."

"Thirty-one?" Donna said, trying to stop herself from smiling. "Shaves a few years off."

She caught the Doctor's subtle eye roll and Rose's twisted smile. Tim, it seemed, was out of it. She expected Psychboy to be snickering or giving some kind of sassy remark, but he was entirely zoned out, staring off into space, eyes glazed.

"And you believe Donna is Schala because she's a ginger who happened to be traveling with three other people. Never mind that she has known her biological, entirely human parents her whole life."

"I gave explicit instructions that she not know who she was until her thirtieth birthday." Gwendolyn said with a bit of a sneer in her tone. "And seeing as how the only person in your party that remotely resembles that of my people, Schala's protector, is younger than she it is entirely possible that the one meant to relay such information had passed on before they had a chance to share it with my daughter or her successor."

"So I, er, Schala had a protector with her in this legend." Donna asked the Queen. "Who were the other two supposed to be?"

Gwendolyn shrugged. "It was never specified. Only three. I had suspected that the tall man was your lover, and the young one your servant," She went on to explaining, earning a coughed laugh from Tim and nothing but squawks of disgust from the Doctor. "That was, of course, until they had explained their affection for each other."

Donna turned to see Spaceman looking far more pale than normal, ready to run for the TARDIS after shagging Rose against the nearest wall as proof of his sexuality. Tim was hiding his face behind his hands, fingers pressed to his temple as if the whole thing gave him a headache.

Rose was simply amused, and she smirked so wickedly that Donna couldn't help but return it.

"But none of it matters now, my sweet Schala. You have returned, and there is much cause for celebration, as well as much to prepare for. If I'm to be honest, it is a blessing that you have been brought back two days prior to what we expected."

"Why's that?" Donna asked.

Gwendolyn smiled, clasping her hands. "The war was prevented, though it was done so with a few agreements set in place. It was obviously made known that it was possible you wouldn't return, but if you were to, if you were to come back to me like you had, it was promised that …." A knock on the door interrupted Gwendolyn, and she craned her head to see around Donna. "Yes?" She called, and a moment later the door opened.

"Forgive me, Queen Gwendolyn." A rich, smooth male voice begged the Queen's forgiveness, and it sent prickles over Donna's ears at just how positively lovely it was. She turned, seeing an exotic, well dressed man rising from a bow. His skin was like milk chocolate, his eyes like jade, his hair … well, the hair color was odd and could probably be darkened up a bit, but near dirty blonde color was lovely even if the length could use a bit off lopping off. He was dressed similar to Tim but with teal colors and gold stitching. "I was asked to come see you at my earliest convenience."

"Thornon, thank you." She said as she got to her feet, pulling Donna along with her. "I'm sure you heard the news."

Thornon glanced uneasily at Donna before he smiled a beautiful, would make her knees weak if he weren't an alien smile, and Donna couldn't help smile back even though he was pointedly not looking at her. "I have, your Grace." He said as he put his hands behind his back.

"Then please, allow me the absolute pleasure of introducing you to your betrothed, by lovely Schala."

Donna's smile fell, her jaw dropped, and she whirled around to stare at the Queen in utter disbelief. "His what?" She growled.

Gwendolyn smiled apologetically. "I know you were probably told as a child that as a woman of Namtier you had all the freedoms you could desire, and as a princess that would have been so much more. But the only way to settle the tensions was to reestablish the old custom of betrothal. A son of the West to a daughter of the East. A daughter that would take up the crown. I never had any other daughters, Schala."

"So you're saying, what, exactly? Because you before, before he," She said, pointing in the general direction of the man behind her, "walked into the room you were going on about how grateful you were I was brought back early. Why?"

Gwendolyn smiled weakly, and with was taking everything in Donna not to slap it off the woman before her. "Because in two days I will lose my daughter once again as I step down, and you rise in my place. As Queen, with Lord Thornon as your husband as you were always meant to."

* * *

 

"Get me out of here right now, Spaceman, or so help me." Donna threatened, and Rose had to give herself a mental pat on the back for learning to refrain from laughing so well.

There was Donna standing in front of the Doctor, looking all the world like someone playing dress up, yelling at an alien who merely stared back at her.

"We can't just leave." The Doctor replied calmly. "We leave, we potentially restart the threats that nearly launched one of the most peaceful planets in the Universe into civil war. A planet ran entirely by women, Donna. When the male of a species decides it goes to war it's a blood bath because most just sort of point their weapons at the other guy until one of them loses. Females are much more vicious in their quest for power."

"That so? Wanna find out how vicious I can be?" Donna growled.

"Didn't need to be psychic to see that coming." Tim grumbled as he scratched behind his ear with second hand embarrassment that made Rose snort.

"Listen, I will get you out of this, I promise." The Doctor said, gripping Donna's upper arms and forcing her to look at him. "But before we do that, we need to find out what happened to the real Princess Schala so we can leave this planet knowing that a mother has been given answers, and perhaps a region can move on." He let go once Donna nodded, straightening up. "And like you're really going to complain about being treated like a Queen for the next couple days while we get this sorted."

"Oh you're just loving this." Donna rolled her eyes as she crossed her arms, making her appear that much more comical to have such an undignified stance in such refined clothing.

"You? With a quarter of a planet under your control? Worst bloody nightmare, that. Worse than Cybermen rising, or Daleks cropping up again." The Doctor replied, earning himself a firm smack across the cheek that had Rose lose control on her laugh. "You slapped me!" The Doctor said, voice a couple pitches higher as he clasped his reddening cheek.

"You bloody deserved it!" Donna snapped back. "Forcing me to play this part and stringing this poor, desperate woman along, not to mention the bloke. I don't care how bloody gorgeous he is, I don't do alien. I prefer my men rich, handsome, and human."

"Two outta three ain't bad." Rose tried to add some humor to the situation only to get a glare from Donna. It didn't last long, the ginger softening a moment later before she turned and moved to sit on the empty chair next to the small sofa Rose and and Tim had crammed on.

"I don't look anything like them." Donna said after a moment, her voice much softer and much more in control. "How can they possibly believe I'm Schala?"

"She took on the traits of her father," The Doctor reminded, leaning against the wall of Donna's small sitting room. "It's rare, normally the dominate species is the one that would take hold. In this situation, it seems, that's not the case."

"You make it sound like you know who the father was." Rose said, eyes narrowed on the Doctor.

He glanced at Tim, causing Rose to do the same.

Tim looked at his knees. "He was human." He said sheepishly. "I could … see it. When Gwen was talking, I saw it in my mind. Sight things have been flaring a bit more since we've been here, and paired with the odd snippets of conversation …." He shook his head. "My head is so full right now it's giving me a fracking headache."

"May I?" The Doctor asked Tim, giving zero indication as to what he was going to do. Tim shrugged, brushing his hair behind both ears as the Doctor came over and knelt in front of him. "Anything you don't want me to see put behind a door." He said before closing his eyes and putting his fingers on Tim's temples. After a couple silent minutes, both men opened their eyes and the Doctor pulled his fingers back. "Walls should help silence everything. You shouldn't be able to hear me and Rose, or anyone else unless you want to. Can't do anything about the visions though. Can't even access that part of your brain."

"What did you do to him?" Donna asked, not unkindly.

"He helped lower the volume on my telepathy." Tim replied. "I've been hearing shite as well as seeing it since we got here."

"Which is so bloody weird that it adds to this whole insane situation." The Doctor said as he got to his feet, eyes squinting and hands in his pockets.

"Hey, me first. He's just going a little more mental, I'm bloody engaged." Donna reminded firmly.

A knock on the door paused the conversation as all turned to see who was entering.

A young woman walked in, carrying a long teal dress with gold trim. She bowed to Donna. "Your Grace," She said, "I have brought you your dress for this evening."

"My what for what?" Donna asked, blinking in confusion.

The handmaid laughed, smiling sweetly before collecting herself. "Your gown for the ball being thrown in your honor. Your return to the East is one to be celebrated, and Queen Gwendolyn will do so in the most splendid ways."

"You don't happen to know when the next moonless night's supposed to be." The Doctor asked the young woman.

She glanced at Donna, then up at him. "Two days time, my Lord."

"Oh, look at that." Donna said, "Got a bit of the title right."

"It's my species not my title." He said with an eye roll. He glanced back at the handmaid, squinting again before rubbing his eyes and giving his head a light shake.

Donna shook her head, but out of humor. "Thank you, Layla." Donna said, dismissing the girl who bowed and shuffled out. "So, two nights to get this sorted. Think you can get all this sorted by then?" She asked as she got up and moved to the bed.

"With time to spare." The Doctor said with confidence. "Though perhaps we should leave Princess Donna to sort herself out before her grand introduction into society."

"Oi, watch it Spaceman." Donna sassed as she got up to inspect the garment. "I can make your life miserable here."

"You can do that on the TARDIS well enough." He retorted, and Rose caught the smile they sent each other before he, Tim, and herself made to leave Donna's room. Once out in the corridor, the Doctor became the picture of seriousness once more. "Tim, anything you see or hear, anything at all that might point us in the direction we should be looking, tell me."

"Will do, Storm boy." He said before turning in the opposite direction of them. He paused. "Exactly how does one behave at a royal ball on an alien planet?"

"Like you would at a royal ball on Earth." The Doctor countered like it was obvious.

"Yeah, never really been to one of those. Might need a little more guidance than that."

"Just come and find us." Rose reassured before she and the Doctor headed back toward her room. He remained quiet, focused, and closed off the entire way there, gripping her hand and sending her affection but keeping everything else held back. "Penny for your thoughts?" She asked him.

"Something's not right here. Something's off. And more than just this whole mistaken identity." He said, looking down at Rose. "There are minds brushing against mine that shouldn't be. These people are not known to be telepathic, and while it doesn't seem like they all have the ability, the ones that do are screaming. Not painfully, not to me, but it's like … like having someone brush against the door of an apartment. You wouldn't open it, you might not even investigate it cause it's likely just one of your neighbors, but it's annoying. Especially when it happens repeatedly."

"How's it I can't feel it?" Rose asked softly. "I could communicate with the Ood, but it's not like I can with Tim."

"You'd have had to have had skin contact with Tim," He partly explained, and half reminded. "Entirely touch telepath, you are. Your beautiful mind has had it's telepathic receptors awakened and nurtured, but mostly for me. You could hear the Ood when you touched it because it was a strong telepath. On this planet, Tim's latent ability has been amplified somehow. It's possible you might hear him, but it's a long shot."

"He did keep brushing his hand against mine." Rose considered. "Every possibility that the touch allowed him into the conversation."

The Doctor's eyes narrowed, darkening a touch too much to just be in thought. "Maybe." He said almost grudgingly.

* * *

 

The people of East Namtier seem to enjoy jewel tones to counter their overly pale complexions. As Rose and the Doctor stood beside Donna on her throne, the former because she was meant to be her protector, the latter because he was a man without another purpose in the eyes of their hosts, the Bad Wolf took in the scene of dancers. There was something completely enchanting about watching the dancers move across the floor, the way the ball gowns of the women swirling about as they turned and twisted as they followed moves Rose's brain catalog and memorized.

"See that bloke dancing with Elda?" Donna pointed out as she lifted her goblet of wine off a tray held by a footman. The woman in question was only distinguishable in the see of similar woman because of the gold sash she wore over her teal ball gown. "He's my twin brother, Locke. Nice enough, really. Loves me simply for showing up. He's engaged to Elda, who was put in her position as the captain of the guard to establish herself with the court. Says she's nice enough, little harsh to the males of the world."

"Caught up on all the latest celebrity gossip, have you?" The Doctor teased from his spot beside Rose.

"Oi, Spaceman, I got important information, thank you." Donna replied. "For instance, Elda was trained to be Queen as soon as she could walk despite everyone around here firmly believing Schala was to return." She turned her head. "You see, apparently the West believes the Princess is dead." She said in more hushed tones, and Rose glanced to see that Queen Gwendolyn was still firmly engaged in conversation by the banquet table of nibbles. She caught the Doctor staring longingly after it and she shot him a glare.

"Why's that?" The Doctor asked as if he hadn't been distracted by the thought of bite-sized morsels of savory goodness.

"Because no one ever remembers the Princess, or anyone, being logged as going off world at the time of her disappearance. You have to document it as travel is only done through a port in the West. And despite the arrangement with 'Lord' Thornon, the prince has never been asked to keep, shall we say, pure for his future bride?" Donna said, perhaps enjoying the idea of a flipped society a little too much. "He was the last born, has a dozen sisters and a couple brothers ahead of him, and it's rumored that he's been flirting with a princess from the south, though it still wouldn't put him anywhere near the throne."

"Why does that all sound like a Disney movie?" The Doctor asked Rose.

"Because you took a few weeks to binge watch the first two hundred animated films a few years back." Rose replied dryly, her attention returning to the dancers. "Bound to be at least one that sounds similar to a fairytale world like this. You have mentioned most of our Earth fairy tales were actual legends from other planets."

"Wait until Evangeline comes out in 2035. Changed the ending, Disney usually does, but still. So beautiful." The Doctor said to Donna.

"He cried." Rose smirked.

"Did not!" His voice broke, and she watched him straighten his tie out of the corner of her eye. "I told you, salt from the popcorn got in my eye at a very inconvenient time."

As she shook her head, Rose spotted Tim walking up to them in his more regal looking attire that consisted of adding a sashed belt and cravat to his earlier ensemble, both teal. He smiled and nodded at a few of the girls that passed him, ignoring their smiles and giggles and looks over their shoulders as he headed right over to them. Tim bowed before Donna with exaggerated flourish before standing and straightening his tunic.

"So I can still hear people," he cut to the chase. "Did you know that I apparently look like good stalk? And I'm pretty sure that if this was a bar in our time on Earth, I'd have run out of places to put the numerous phone numbers."

"Don't know what anyone sees, honestly." Donna said with a non-committal shrug.

"With dudes like Thornon and that, that prince Locke dude, and the others roaming about, neither do I!" Tim said with all seriousness before stepping around to stand at Rose's right.

"Well, on some planets lithe is considered a good sign of virility," The Doctor said with a pompous tone, his chin lifting a bit as he once more straightened his blazer. "It's considered a sign of endurance, a more comfortable fit."

"I think they've no idea what they'd be missing, then." Donna cut him off matter-of-factly, and the Doctor rolled his eyes. "Too much muscle, yeah, that can be unappealing. But a strong set of shoulders, enough meat that they can't give ya a paper cut."

"Strong arms that in case you," Rose said dreamily, her mind going back to nearly forgotten fantasies of her first Doctor. "Just enough to be possessed but not so much to feel smothered." She said with a bite of her lip, and Donna hummed in agreement.

Rose glanced at the Doctor, and he looked mildly put out but the light in his eyes told her he knew what she was thinking. She reached out a hand, lacing their fingers together, and she caught a pouty sounding, "This body can be all possessive and protective too."

"Not the same, though." Rose confessed, sending him her memory of what it felt like to be wrapped in his previous arms on the Cupla ship. To her surprise, the Doctor blushed.

"Right, well," he said, tugging on his ear with his free hand. "If Tim can hear how many women here are interested in using him to secure their family lines, than I should investigate. See what may possibly be going on here to magnify the telepathic abilities of those with latent ones."

"So you're scanning for alien tech, then?" Rose teased.

"Yes, actually," he replied with a manic grin.

"Too bad."

"Why's that?" He asked.

"I wanted to dance," Rose confessed turning to her partial bond mate with a flirtatious grin she didn't have to pull often. "You always want to dance with me at these things, come on." She said with a nod to the floor before them where there was a pause in the festivities while the musicians tuned their instruments.

"Not tonight, Sweetheart." He said as he pulled out his sonic. "I've had enough of the mental brushes, and once I understand how that's actually happening I will be able to focus my attention on getting Donna off the throne." Before Rose could argue, he kissed her knuckles and took off.

"You could have ordered him to stay," Donna reminded her. "Nice and loud, make it so he would be looked down on should he have declined again."

"You're loving this power thing, aren't you?" Rose teased with a wide grin, her disappointment nearly forgotten.

"The forced marriage, the fawning would-be mother, the corsets? Not so much. But the idea of being in charge …?" She didn't finish her sentence as Thornon approached them, smiling uncomfortably and bowing before Donna.

"Lady Schala, may I have this dance? It is a custom for those who are betrothed to share at least one." He explained, clearly understanding the Donna knew nothing of the customs of Namtier, or at least the East.

"Oh, see? Spaceman's got an obligation to fill." Donna said as she placed her hand in Thornon's extended hand.

"And we both know what he'd say to that." Rose countered.

"Oh no, Blondie. It's you who points out it's not official, never him." With that, Donna had the last word.

Rose stood behind the now empty throne, stunned. "I do do that, don't I?" She asked Tim.

He shrugged. "You're technically not wrong." He sided with her, which she supposed was kind of how their dynamic of four worked. "So, you still want that dance?" He asked, turning to her with his hand toward her, palm up. "I've been around the room a few times, stepped on enough feet that I think I have it mastered. And besides, you need to stay near Donna."

"Do I?" Rose asked as she put her hand on Tim's.

She scrunched her face as she heard a hum in her mind similar to what happens when she and Jenny make contact, but with a very faint whisper of words she couldn't quite hear.

Tim seemed to understand. "Yeah, Wolf Girl. You really do tonight." He said, and the two walked out to the dance floor and took up positions a few couples down from Donna and Thornon.

The musicians all played the same note, and then the crowd moved along with the music. Within the first three moves, Tim stepped on her toes.

"Sorry," He blushed as he chuckled.

"'S alright." Rose shrugged as they followed the steps. "You're doing better than the fair Princess." She mused, glancing over at Donna. The ginger seemed to be charming Thornon, at least, though it was clear she had little to no idea how the dance went.

Tim, however, did get the gist despite his initial fumble. After the first pass, he became more confident, his smile growing as he became more graceful.

By the fourth lifted spin, he set Rose down more slowly as he was supposed to. "You're not as heavy as I remember." He observed.

"Helps that I'm breathing at the moment," Rose replied as their palms made contact again, the hum of their contact sounding more like a laugh.

"Yeah, I suppose." Tim agreed with a slight nod. "I feel his eyes on the back of my head." He said conversationally, making Rose glance to the side of the room opposite of the banquet table. She spotted the Doctor looking in their direction, sonic still in hand, but his stance made is so no one dared go near him. He was the destroyer of worlds, the bringer of death, and while it was all focused on her dance partner for no reasonable reason what-so-ever, everyone stayed cautiously clear. "Pretty sure I can hear him wanting to kill me. Guess there's a touch too much touching for his liking. I take it that means you hadn't told him about that one night where we practically had to spoon for warmth."

"Oh, I did." Rose replied with a sigh and an apologetic smile. "Guess he was still too thrilled I lived to care about the particulars at the time."

"Great," he said sarcastically.

A brush of someone's hand on Rose's arm caused them to still.

"Kill Schala and I never have to…." She had fleetingly heard a woman say in her mind, and she abandoned Tim in time to charge after a figure who reached up to her bodice.

It was quick, much faster than Rose had anticipated, and she could almost feel the pull of unused muscles straining to move faster than they had in a while. She grabbed the woman by the arm and flung her backward as the dagger hidden in the bodice of her dress came down. Rose in turn stepped between a screaming Donna and the blade, pushing the ginger back into the arms of Thornon as the blade entered Rose's chest and just missed her heart.

The attacking woman let go, eyes wide in terror as Rose stood tall with the short blade still in her chest. Castle guards swarmed on her, and as they grabbed the woman by the arms all Rose heard her scream and repeat was, "Schala has to die. She can't live. The region will fall if Schala lives!"

As the commotion died down, and a murmured hum took it's place, Rose looked down at the hilt of the blade. Wrapping her hand around it, she pulled it out with a grunt, her other hand immediately putting pressure on the wound to stop the bleeding.

"Here, Wolf Girl." Tim said as he came up to her, cravat off and half wrapped around his hand as he put better pressure on the wound. "Aren't going to pass out, are you?" He asked with genuine concern.

"Already feel myself healing," Rose reassured with a shake of her head, her attention on the ornate detail of the dagger hilt.

"Hands off." She heard the Doctor command before she felt his presence next to her. She'd have rolled her eyes or given him a glare if she hadn't noticed Thornon looking at the dagger with cold fear.

"You know what this is, don't you?" She asked him over the whir of the sonic, ignoring the heat it pulsed on her skin around the wound to stop the bleeding a little quicker.

Thornon swallowed and nodded. "The silver handle, the blue jewel, the … the owl with it's wings spread, it's all a symbol. Part of the collection from the Western royal family. My family."

"Then someone from your family, country, which ever, wants Donna-Schala-dead." Rose said evenly.

"Not possible." Thornon said firmly.

"Well I'd say it's pretty bloody likely." Donna said, voice shaking. "That dagger was coming for me. I'm a target, a walking, bloody target."

"Which means we need to be a lot quicker at finding the real princess." Rose nodded. "Because I have a feeling this will happen again unless we stop them, or they've killed you."


	24. A Pauper as a Princess pt 2

Donna had barely slept the night before, and instead spent a lot of time wishing she could have done something to help Rose settle. After the attempt on her life in the throne room, the party had come to an end, and the four travelers returned to Donna's chambers where Gwendolyn joined them shortly.

"I can not begin to express my gratitude toward you, dear Rose, for you have surely saved my daughter's life." She had said, clasping Rose's hands.

"It was nothing, honestly." Rose tried to shrug it off.

"Regardless, I still can not thank you enough. Tonight, I do wish for you to stay with Schala as additional protection, but perhaps tomorrow I can introduce you to a few of the finest gentleman our land has to offer. Surely you could be entertained and pleased by one of our own." She had glanced at the Doctor, "Seeing as how those you travel with are more interested in one another."

"Umm," Rose blushed deeply, clearing her throat. "I'm fine, Queen Gwendolyn." She replied with a bow of her head.

"Then perhaps you would like to accompany Schala on a trip through our country side? Your … what ever they are could tag along too, I suppose." Gwendolyn had suggested with a warm, tender smile.

"That would be fine." Rose relented, and Donna had half expected it was so there wouldn't be any more suggestions made. She could see Rose was exhausted, her eyes betraying the amount of pain she was in.

"Excellent. We shall leave yourself and Schala for the evening." Gwendolyn said, her voice raised and commanding in such a way that Donna knew it was meant to be heard by the men in the room.

The Queen had left first, the boys following shortly after the Doctor gave Rose a rather firm, possessive kiss. Layla and one of the other handmaids came by with night clothes, and she and Rose took turns in the highly civilized bathroom to prepare for bed.

Donna's mind had been racing, worried and wondering what the chances were that they could get off the bloody planet without it resulting in war. So when Rose began to whimper, she heard it. She had tossed and turned a bit in their shared bed, the mattress large enough that Rose wouldn't have hit Donna with her thrashing. She'd heard snippets of pleas, for the Doctor, for her, for Tim. She heard Rose plead to not need to kill, to let others live, the muffled cries of anguish. Her nightmares seemed to come in steady waves all night, and even a comforting hand and soft spoken words of assurances hadn't seemed to soothe her.

When dawn finally broke, Layla came in with a smile that quickly faltered. "First night in a strange bed?" She asked sympathetically as she set down a pile of garments on Donna's vanity table.

"Doesn't help to know your life was on the line." Donna replied as Rose rose from the mattress as well. "I'm sorry about your nightmares." She apologized to her friend.

Rose pushed her wild hair from her face, and looked at Donna apologetically. "Sorry I kept you awake." She said as she climbed out of bed.

"You didn't." She said with a yawn.

"Well, I will ensure to have our wakefulness tea brought up to you instead of the usual breakfast one." Layla said as she laid out Donna's clothes beside Rose's tunic on the divan near the fireplace. "It makes you feel as if you've had a full night's sleep for the majority of the day. I understand that you will be riding with Lord Thornon, the Prince, and Lady Elda today."

"Oh, well, you know more of my social calendar than I do, it seems." Donna said as she walked up to the woman, smiling warmly.

"It's my job to, my lady. How else am I supposed to know to have your riding clothes brought up instead of the normal dress?" She asked with a coy smile.

"I suppose," Donna nudged her with her shoulder. "How long have you worked here at the Castle, Layla?"

"Since I was tall enough to stir the cooking pot, my lady." Layla replied. "But I've lived here my whole life. My mum was a cook, and my father a stable hand. Being a girl, I was given priority for work, and I worked hard enough to earn my position with you." She paused, considering. "Well, I suppose I had originally earned my position as Lady Elda's maid, but then you arrived and I had been reassigned."

"Did it surprise you, my return?" Donna asked, noting Rose gathering her clothes and heading to the bathroom.

Layla seemed to consider this. "No," She said simply, sounding resigned. "I suppose not."

"Why?" Donna asked. "Why do you say it like that?"

Layla smiled sadly, "Because I knew it was too good of a story to think that a man of high birth, a man with a warm soul and a gentle heart, could be with a simple servant girl. Even if it would be her right to marry whom she wanted." She snapped out of her partial day dream. "I'll go fetch you that tea, my lady. Both you and your guardian will need to appear your best."

* * *

 

"Ah, and there is our lovely Schala," Thornon greeted Donna brightly as she, Rose, the Doctor and Tim joined the riding party that included Prince Locke, Elda, and a couple of guards.

"Please call me Donna when Queen Gwendolyn isn't around." Donna asked as Thornon took her hand and clasped it in his.

"When you are Queen, you may go by any name you wish," He reminded her with coy smile before escorting her to one of only two unoccupied horses. "But since you made the request, and I am duty bound to oblige: Donna, would you like a hand getting up in the saddle?"

Rose smiled as Donna blushed, a rarity for the ginger, as well as not being able to do much more than nod.

"Lady Rose," Elda addressed her curtly. "Your horse is the one with the yellow tail. I'm sorry, but your … companions will have to walk. We could not spare the additional animals for men of low birth." She said quite bluntly, refusing to look at the Doctor or Tim.

"Companions?" The Doctor said from behind her, spatting the word.

"Wait a bloody minute." Donna said from a top her horse. "Why couldn't you round up two more horses? You got four guards riding, and all us high and mighties, and Rose. So why can't a Time Lord and a … useful twig have a horse themselves?"

Elda's mouth moved but nothing came out.

Locke laughed, his voice not nearly as smooth as Thornon's, but deep and friendly nonetheless. "All these years of being the second highest ranked female in the land, and now Lady Elda has been knocked down a peg. I knew I liked having you around Scha-er-Donna."

Donna smiled proudly. "Indeed." She said with faux hauteur.

"There really aren't any, though." Thornon came to Elda's defense. "It's expected that there be a reserve of at least six horses in the royal stables should the Queen need to make a hasty escape, as well as have an adequate number of guards to keep her safe. That was all that remained after we rounded up what we currently have. Not to mention we were not made aware of your gentleman friends' accompaniment. Lord or not."

"Well," Donna said considering the possibilities. "Then they'll just have to ride with us, then, won't they?"

"Princess Schala, that would hardly be acceptable." Elda spat, whirling around and seeming to forget decorum as she growled at Donna. "Men should not be granted such privilege, and I certainly do not believe a man who would dress as such be anything more than a lucky soul who was taken pity on." She hissed, gesturing to the Doctor.

"Guess you shoulda wore the blue suit." Tim said, and Rose turned to smile with him only to see the Doctor looking coldly down at the shorter man. Tim, it seemed, didn't seem to care that a storm was brewing over his head.

"Excuse me." Donna huffed, putting her hands on her hips for a brief second before the shift in balance made her grab the reins quickly. "But which one of us here is in charge? They are my friends, and if I say the ride with us, they bloody well ride with us. Ya got that blondie, or do I need to say it with a little more command?"

Elda's head dropped in a bow. "Of course not, Princess."

"Good." Donna said with a nod. "Come on up, Pyschboy. You take the reins."

"Me?" Tim said incredulously, hands on his chest and eyes wide. "I can't freakin' ride a horse. I haven't even seen a horse that wasn't mounted by a cop. I grew up in the city, where the frack would I have had the chance to learn to ride?"

Donna turned to the Doctor. "Come on, then, Spaceman. Looks like you're driving."

"Can't you ride with Rose?" He half whined, pouting up at Donna.

Elda shot him a glare, but Rose shot her a more fierce one back. She looked to where Elda's hand was poised to grip a dagger sheathed at her belt, looking up at the Captain of the Guard in warning. "No." Rose said simply, turning to the Doctor when Elda finally stood down. He looked at her with wide eyes, a touch of fear in them that Rose didn't really understand. "We follow the rules and customs of planets where we can," Rose reminded him. "Here, that means you'll have to ride with Donna, and Tim and I will be right beside you, yeah?"

He sighed, resigned to this despite clearly not liking it. He moved toward Donna's horse, and she shifted back a bit to allow the Doctor to gracefully swing himself up into the saddle in front of her.

"Need help, Tim?" Rose asked, as she climbed up into the saddle of the horse with ease.

"Nope." He replied, sounding a bit out of breath as he climbed up behind her in fair less graceful manner.

The rest of the party took to their horses.

"To the hills!" Locke proclaimed, laughing jovially like this was a trip guaranteed to bring adventure.

"Hold on," Rose said over her shoulder to Tim as she nudged the horse into a trot. Tim's hands gripped her hips tightly the second they started moving, and she heard a silent string of curses come out uncensored under his breath. She sucked her lips in to stop from laughing, her chest vibrating a little before she sniffed and pulled herself together.

The region proved as gorgeous and dream like as it had the day before. Perhaps more as the crested the first of the hills a fair distance away from the castle and was given the lovely sight of a light fog lingering along the lower valleys. They rode through it, and while Tim tensed on the gallop down, Rose could hear him laughing as they raced with the others through the mist.

Once up on the highest of the hills with the mountains and castle behind them and a distant view of a great lake before them, the party stopped.

Guards doubled as servants, laying out blankets and setting out baskets as the royals and nobles dismounted and settled.

"Blimey, that's breath taking," Donna said as she fixed the train of her riding cloak after she was settled on her feet.

"And it is yours, Donna." Thornon reminded. "This land is your birthright. It is only appropriate that you get to see it's beauty like this."

"Princess Donna," The Doctor said loudly. "Would you mind ever so terribly if I kept the horse for a bit and took lady Rose around the countryside?"

Rose had just hopped off her horse, helped an unsteady and slightly shaky Tim down, and still hadn't let go of his hand as she turned to the Doctor. He smiled, but there wasn't any body to it.

"Umm, sure, what ever you'd like, Spaceman."

"You can't," Elda overrode, getting down off her horse. "She is Princess Schala's protector, and as such, needs to stay with her. You can not go gallivanting with important officials."

"Then perhaps we may have a blanket a slight distance away so that I may discuss things in private with her?" He asked as he hopped off the horse, his posture tense and his voice carefully polite.

Elda looked ready to argue.

"Fine," Donna said with a shrug. "Pretty sure I'll be okay a few feet away."

Donna glanced at Rose, eyebrow raised in a silent question that Rose could only answer with a shrug.

She had no idea what the Doctor's problem was, except maybe his forced night away from her and being treated like an inferior instead of the most clever person anywhere was getting to him. He'd never admit it, but his ego was likely not handling being put third in their party's hierarchy.

After a bit of rearranging, Rose joined the Doctor on their own private blanket further down the slop of the hill than the others. One of smaller baskets of food had been left with them, though neither touched it. Settling next to him felt awkward in a way that hadn't been present in so long that it felt as alien as he was, and she took a long look at his tense, dark gaze as it focused out on the landscape.

"What is wrong with you?" She finally snapped softly, not wanting the others to hear.

"I found a telepathic enhancer last night," He ignored her actual question. The Doctor spoke in his usual tone, none of the menace he was physically exuding carrying over. "Looked quite a bit like the dampeners that were surrounding the Ood brain. Didn't get a great look at it, guards patrolling the castle halls a little more than I was expecting, even with an attempt on the supposed Princess's life. May have to try again tonight if I'm forbidden to stay with you again."

"Is that why you're in a huff?" Rose asked a little sharply, getting him to look at her. He looked like a child getting caught doing something he shouldn't, but she refused to smile at it. "'Cause I was asked to stay with Donna?"

"Among other reasons," He said in a low grumble. "How did you sleep last night?" He asked, the bitterness returning to his gaze as he changed the subject. He stroked her cheek, brushing her hair back at the same time in a gentle, tender gesture. "You look … refreshed." He said with a bit of defeat to his voice.

"Had this amazing tea this morning." Rose replied. "Makes ya feel like you've had a full night's rest even when you slept terribly. Donna was too shaken, I think, to get any rest. And I, well, I certainly didn't have any pleasant dreams." She admitted, not wanting to recall a second of her blood soaked nightmare.

"Just tea? Nothing else gave a pep in your step?" He asked, popping the 'p' before grimacing. "A phrase I will not say again, I hope."

"Doctor, what is going on?" She asked again.

He was saved from answering by the blood curdling scream of Donna, along with the not so masculine ones coming from the two royal men. The female guards were pushing everyone behind them while also backing away. All eyes were focused on the picnic blanket.

Rose was on her feet and darting over before she considered the danger she was throwing herself into.

Just as she got there, Tim stepped around the guard that was loosely protecting him and knelt down with his hand outstretched and his palm up. A spider crawled into it, covering the span of skin entirely.

"Look at this beauty," He said to Rose with a grin before slowly lifting his hand and getting back on his feet. He brought the spider to eye level, looking at it. "Kinda reminds me of that one we saw just hanging out while we were trying to find a place to camp a couple weeks into our walk."

"Where the bloody hell were you trying to make camp where there were spiders that bloody big?" Donna asked from over Thornon's shoulder.

"Just the woods." Tim said nonchalantly. "He's not that big, really."

"You're a mad man if you think handling that thing was a good idea." Elda sneered as she kept a firm hand on Locke's chest in protection. "Those things will stop your heart in a matter of moments if you let it bite you. And they aren't known for being docile."

"Oh, this little fella wouldn't hurt Tim," The Doctor said with confidence as he walked up to him, hand outstretched. The spider wouldn't leave Tim's palm for that of the cooler-running Time Lord, and the Doctor glared at the spider and mumbled something before saying, "Might make his hand ache or itch, but nothing more. Venom isn't all that dangerous to humans, this one." He said, looking around the crowd as he stuffed his hands in his pockets. "Nor Time Lords. But Namtierians, you lot have a highly sensitive immune system. This lil fella would cripple or kill one of you in a matter of seconds, as Elda so wonderfully pointed out. You know what's odd about this little fella though," He asked, turning to Rose and posing the question to her. She smirked, shaking her head as she saw the joy return to his eyes for the first time since landing on this planet. "Not indigenous to the planet. Come from Earth. A Wolf Spider, though this one is a little bigger than the one of your time. Likely came from a later century when interstellar travel became a norm. Probably brought along in a shipment of goods, or as a gift. But there is one thing that can be said for certain," He said, looking more serious before turning to the group who all seemed to remain statue still. "You lot didn't just stumble upon this little guy roaming the country side. He was planted here, brought along in one of the baskets, and likely meant to give a fatal bite to your lovely, if not loud mouthed, princess."

"So someone's tried to kill me. Again." Donna said, stepping out from around Thornon and the guard in front of them. She looked ready to yell at someone, anyone, whoever managed to piss her off most with their next words.

"We will get to the bottom of this, my lady." Elda said with confidence. "We will return to the castle, have every member of the kitchen staff questioned extensively, find out what is going on." She shot a distrustful glance at Thornon. "And I know exactly who we should be questioning first and most thoroughly."

Thornon looked away from Elda, his cheeks coloring in an almost greenish tint as if he couldn't blush pink.

"So much for a lovely day out, eh, sweet sister?" Locke asked, still sounding shaken by the tiny beast that interrupted their day.

"What should we do with this little beastie?" Tim asked, extending his hands toward the Doctor and Rose. "If he's that dangerous to the locals, we can't just set him free."

The Doctor thrust his hands in his pockets, searching about for a tiny bit until he pulled out a mason jar-like thing with a wired caged top. He unscrewed the lid, extending the jar toward Tim's hand. With a gentle nudge, the spider crawled inside the jar. Tim got down on his hands and knees, plucked some grass and a couple of twigs from the ground and put it in the jar with the spider. As he brushed his hands on his pants, the Doctor screwed the top back on the jar and shoved it in his pockets.

"How convenient that you happened to have such a home for the creature on you." Elda said accusingly. "And you used such magic to keep it hidden."

"Sorry?" The Doctor asked, looking bewildered.

"I suppose I just find it odd that you and your male friend are both immune to the bite of such a deadly creature, and you have such means to keep it with you." Elda insinuated, her suspicion evident. "I would suggest, then, Doctor, that perhaps you should find yourself in the kitchen with the staff when we return for questioning." And on that note, Elda swung herself back up on her horse.

Donna came over to them. "They really believe I'm one of them, then?" She asked, still sounding a bit shaken.

"Yes." The Doctor said in a low voice. "So let's keep them thinking that." He then paused, an idea coming to him in a way that Rose could see his eyes brighten as the light came on inside his head. "Lord Thornon," He said in a warm, friendly tone. He even went so far as to bow a little. "Perhaps on the return to the castle you could share your steed with the lovely Princess, help you two get more acquainted since she doesn't know how to ride."

"Oi, what are you getting at, here, Spaceman?" Donna asked, hands on her hips and a scowl on her face.

"Well, we are still needing to partner up, so why not do so with your fiancee?"

"And what about you?" She asked suspiciously.

"Well, Tim doesn't know how to ride so he'll have to be with me, won't he?" The Doctor said, sounding positively proud of the idea.

And it suddenly hit Rose as to why he was acting the way he was.

"Git." She said like a curse, but he ignored her.

"What ever you say, Spaceman." Donna said with a shrug, turning to Thornon and allowing him to help her on his horse before he climbed up behind her, reaching around to take the reins.

"Fair warning, Stormboy, I'm gonna hold on to you like a little girl." Tim said, either not having caught on to what was happening, or not caring in the least.

A million replies danced in the Time Lord's eyes as he mounted his horse, but he said none of them. He allowed the smugness in his grin speak enough of what he thought of the whole arrangement.

Rose bit her tongue, not really wanting to start a silly argument on the Doctor's unfounded jealousy. She instead helped Tim up on the git's horse before getting on her own.

* * *

 

"You look worried," Donna said after observing Thornon for a very long time. Once they'd been returned to the castle, Rose was whisked away with the guards for reasons Donna didn't understand, the Doctor and Tim asked to occupy themselves elsewhere in the meantime. With no one else available to spend time with at the moment, she and Thornon continued the picnic that should have been in the castle gardens. Without the rolling expanse of Eastern Namtier's fields, there wasn't much for Donna to look at except the boring plants and the handsome alien.

He glanced at her, looking bashful for being caught, smiling a little. "If I told you, you would have my head. And, perhaps, the important piece of my anatomy that would be required to continue your family line."

Donna threw her head back in a laugh. "Never." She said with a shake of her head. "You can tell me, promise I won't ask one of the guards for their knife."

Thornon sighed heavily, looking down at the goblet of wine in his hand. "I'm fearful for Layla." He confessed. When he peeked at Donna, he seemed to gain some confidence from her confusion. "I have been her consort for quite sometime, but even being a woman would not exempt her from the harsh methods Elda has been known to use to get information."

"Why would Layla be such a target for Elda?" Donna asked before popping one of the grape-like fruits in her mouth. She couldn't get over the weird, chocolate like flavor that came from it, even though the wine tasted like regular Earth wine.

"Because I am yours as of the moment you arrived." Thornon sighed. "Layla and I have been intimate for years, we have a son, but once you returned her claim on me was instantly relinquished. Now tell me, Donna, would you give up the father of your child so easily?"

"Well, I wouldn't exactly crawl into bed with another woman's fiancee to begin with." She said without thinking, catching the green tint rising in Thornon's cheeks. "Sorry, didn't think."

"No, it's quite alright." He said quickly and sincerely. "In that line of thinking you have Namtier's ways firmly pegged. A woman who sleeps with another woman's mate is considered an adulter, but you had not been here, and I chose to be the consort of Layla despite her station. She's an exquisite woman, and I adore her. I was fiercely proud to be the father of her child, and more so that she acknowledge me as the father."

"Well, you're a prince, why wouldn't she?" Donna asked.

"I'm not even that, Donna. I'm a Lord, as I will never retain the privileges in my home land that my sisters will. I will be lucky as the last born and a son to be granted anything of my parent's wealth. You, my future wife, will have similar control. I gain nothing but a title as your husband. No power, no anything, simply a tie from your region to mine." He smiled. "I take it you were raised in a much more backward society where men are somehow thought of equals?"

Donna smiled, shook her head. "Yeah, though in a lot of places they were still considered dominate."

"May I ask one thing of you, then?" He pleaded, setting his cup aside and taking her hand in his. "Please don't do anything to my son when you are crowned. You seem like a wonderful, kind woman, but I have heard of so many treating the children of their husband as less."

Donna's stomach twisted, guilt clouding her heart and making it impossible to look at him. Had he been a human bloke on Earth, and she was to marry him by choice if at all, she'd have welcomed his son with open arms. Even now, part of her wanted to give the same declaration. But she knew better. She knew, or at least hoped, that they would be off the planet soon and back among the stars. There would be no wedding to Thornon, no joining of their families.

But she couldn't say anything, not now.

So she took a deep breath, and gave him her best charming smile. "If we do marry," She said cautiously, "Because it's still a bit off, we might discover we are terrible together, I promise I would never cause your son harm."

"And his mother? Layla?" He asked earnestly.

Donna snorted, "You wouldn't be the first king to have a mistress." She smirked.

"It could cost me my life." He said in surprise.

"Hey, if I was forced to marry you, I'd gladly let you play around. No offense, you're a handsome bloke and all, but you're a bit too alien for me." She said with a playful grin.

"We are of the same planet," he said with amusement. "I know they say that women are from Faliona 2 and men are from Raxacorton, but I'm pretty sure they never meant that literally." Donna laughed from her gut, head thrown back. She caught Thornon watching her with a contented grin. "I may never love you, Donna, but I can't complain about having to spend my days looking at a woman as beautiful as you." He said sincerely. "And I think you growing up and living a life away from all this political nonsense has only enhanced that beauty."

"Me?" She said with surprise, her cheeks heating up. "Not that gorgeous, me. Especially when I'm standing next to Rose, wouldn't you say?"

"No," Thornon said firmly. "No, Rose is lovely, but you are a rare, wondrous thing."

"And Layla?" She asked, and he suddenly looked guilty. She put a hand on his chin, noting how there didn't seem to be a speck of stubble on the smooth skin. She tilted his head. "If things go the way I want them to, you and her can be together with my blessing." She said firmly.

He nodded, taking her hand from his chin and kissing her knuckles. "I hope that you are entirely sincere in your words, but if you ever have to retract them I will remember this moment and hold it dear in my heart. Because, Donna, I see in your eyes that you mean them at this point in time." He turned away from her was his eyes moistened, and she allowed Thornon his moment while she tried to think of something, anything, the two could talk about that wouldn't lead to one or both being heartbroken.

* * *

 

The day had been long, grueling, and frankly irritating as Rose had to listen to Elda drill every single staff member on the possibility of sending the spider on the picnic. She had to warn her off Layla as she got a bit too aggressive, and once she told Elda off and warned her that she'd report everything the Princess when she started slapping around a young man for no apparent reason. By the end of all the interviews, nothing useful came out of it, and Elda was clearly none too pleased with Rose. When they parted ways, it couldn't be fast enough, and Rose returned to her room to find the Doctor on the bed waiting for her.

And that wasn't much better.

"Hello, Sweetheart." He said warmly as he got up.

"Don't start," She warned him before moving to the adjacent bathroom and used the strange but affective rigging to draw a bath.

"Oi, that's not how you greet your mate after a long day." He said, sounding a little hurt as he followed her inside the room. He stood with his arms crossed over his chest, brow furrowed as he watched her move about the room.

"Not fully your mate, me." Rose snapped back, partly regretting it. "Just partial."

"Rose?" He asked, sounding confused.

She laughed. "What?"

"What's the matter?" He asked, loosening his stance. "Why are you angry with me?"

"I'm not," She snapped back. "I'm annoyed. Frustrated. And a bit insulted." She said as she turned off the water with the tub full, heading back into the other room to snatch a dressing gown. He followed like a puppy.

"Why? Why? What did I do?" He asked sitting on the bed as she moved to the wardrobe. She looked over her shoulder in time for him to have a moment of understanding before it abruptly changed to confusion. "No, can't be it." He said out loud, looking back at her. "Honestly, what did I do? I swear, I could have gone to check out the enhancer, and I probably will later, but I behaved. I stayed here and waited for you."

"Doctor …" Rose started, exasperated, interrupted by a quick knock before Elda came barging in.

"Thank you for your tip, soldier," She had said to the girl who had been posted at Rose's door the day before. "He was going to be hard to find, otherwise."

"What's going on?" Rose asked as the Doctor was apprehended by a pair of big, male soldiers that he could have overpowered if he tried hard enough. Hell, she could have overpowered them if she wanted to.

"He's the only one who could have brought the spider out there." Elda said.

"I wasn't anywhere near the blanket or the food in advance, how could I be the one who …."

"You may not have been." Elda said with a shrug. "But that, paired with your wandering the castle in suspicious manner last night, and your strange behavior at the ball the night before leads me to believe that we should have you detained for a day or two as a precaution." She turned to Rose and glared. "I've already cleared it with the Queen, so do not argue with me on this."

Rose crossed her arms and nodded. "Fine."

Fine. He'd only break out anyway, might as well let him suffer a little bit.

She strolled up to him, taking one of his hands in hers for a moment.

"Time out for the Time Lord to think about what you've done."

"I didn't do anything." He protested.

"No, but your behavior toward our friend has been atrocious, and you need to think on that for a bit." She said, showing him what he looked and sounded like when talking about Tim since the ball the night before.

The Doctor scowled, showing Rose the same events from his perspective. He seemed to emphasize the way Tim held her, or seemed to touch her. He added in, for good measure she supposed, every contact the two shared or inside joke to the Time Lord's ears since he arrived.

Without thinking, Rose slapped him. The contact of her palm with his cheek allowed her a brief moment to mentally yell, "You're a bloody idiot."

Elda chuckled. "Not sure why that happened, but I'm not opposed." She said as she gestured for the guards to take him away.

"Remember he's an innocent man," Rose warned, making the guards pause and the Doctor look a little baffled through his shock. "He's a friend of the Princess, and he hasn't been proven to have done anything wrong by her or this region. I hear about a single scratch, shove, anything that caused him harm, and I promise each and every person in this room that I will bring down a storm of pain none of you have ever known." She said the threat cooly, calmly, and she noticed the shiver of fear that ran through everyone present, Elda and the Doctor included.

"And you?" Elda asked her voice a touch shaky. "What of the wrong he's done by you?"

"Personal. I can handle it myself." She said, turning back toward the bathroom. "Carry on," She said with a wave of her hand before moving to take her bath.

If he honestly thought that Tim was trying to … well, he deserved that dark, dank cell and any discomfort he had coming. As well as possibly a year without seeing her naked.

* * *

 

"Hey Rosie," Jack said cheerfully over the speaker of her super phone. "Haven't died since the last time we talked, have you?"

"Well, when was the last time we talked?" She asked him in turn, leaning back on the overly fluffy pillows in the too big bed that she now knew she'd likely have to sleep in alone. She spent her whole, supposed to be relaxing bath, going back and forth between fretting on how she was going to help Donna and thinking the Doctor was a git.

"Yesterday," He replied. "Poisoned with Cyanide in the 1920s." He replied.

Rose startled. "Seriously? That was the last death I had to you?"

"Yeah, why?" Jack asked, sounding concerned.

"It's the same in my time line." She replied. "'Cept that was nearly a month ago. Honestly, we're in sync?"

"Seems so" He laughed. "So what's with a phone call if you hadn't died? Usually when you want to talk you come visit."

Rose sighed, pushing her hair off her face. "I'm currently on a planet run by women, the Doctor's in jail for possibly trying to kill Donna, and I'm letting him stay there because he thinks that Tim is trying to pull a you with me." She rambled off quickly.

There was a long pause. "Alright, stop. Breathe, and explain everything in much more detail."

She did, as much as she could possibly recall or tell him as it felt like so much had happened since she called him after their trip to see Agatha.

"I've met River." He said after she finished. "Gorgeous woman, much more friendly than I would have expected, and she knew what I liked. You know, liked."

"What about Ianto?" Rose sat up, offended for the charming man who was supposed to be Jack's one and only for now.

"It was before Ianto." He said like that should have been obvious, clearly forgetting for a moment that he was Jack Harkness. "And anyway, you didn't call about the River thing, and if you had, I have to say, you probably know more than I do. My encounter with her was something like me introducing myself, her saying 'Oh I know', and then we were in bed." Rose did have to chuckle at that. "So Donna's mistaken for a princess and the Doctor thinks that Tim wants in your bedchamber. Not sure I know how I can help."

"Well," Rose paused. "Not sure myself, really. Just sorta needed to vent, I guess."

"Look, Rose, with the whole Tim thing, let the Doctor look like an ass when he figures it all out. He's obviously forgotten everything you told him about your time during the year. Not to mention that he was a bit too flirty with Martha, and there was that incident with that Queen who tried to kill you to have him because he didn't know how to tone it down. But the Donna thing?" He took a deep breath. "If I had to guess, it's politics at play. You say the wedding's, what, tomorrow? So who was supposed to be on the throne? The brother? His fiancee? Could be the lover, but I doubt that's the case. Horny Thorny himself, but what would he gain from it? Nothing." He joked, and Rose buried her face in her palm and groan.

"Any idea where, if anywhere, the princess would be hiding?" She asked, hoping for a hint.

"Not a one." Jack replied, obviously still too pleased with his own joke. "Didn't exactly ask for a history lesson."

"Damn," She said, and he laughed. "Well, I can't very well let this go on, and the Doctor's a little incarcerated right now."

"Look into the three most likely suspects," Jack suggested. "And once you get them cleared, if you can't find the princess, leg it. If I remember anything about Namtier culture it's that marriage is considered sacred. No, more than sacred, it's unbreakable. That's why many of the women don't marry so much as take on lovers that live with them. They aren't a strong telepathic species, but they do form light bonds with their mates, like what you and the Doctor have."

"He said they aren't telepathic at all, or shouldn't be." Rose countered.

"Well then I must have visited a more advanced era when I became a … consort." He chuckled wistfully. "Now go be awesome, Rosie. And do me a favor, give that alien a good slap for being such an idiot for me, okay?"

"Already did." She said with a smile that he wouldn't see. "Later, Jack."

"Later, Rosie." He said before they disconnected.

She took a deep breath and allowed herself a moment to decompress before rising off the bed and redressing. The only celebration on the agenda for the evening was a dinner, and for that was a simple dress that had already been laid out.

After, Rose took off in search for Donna, weaving her way through the corridors. She spotted a head of red hair moving past at the end of the corridor, and she hurried to catch up.

"Donna. Oh." She said, stopping short when she spotted the very blonde Layla stopping and turning abruptly. "Oh, sorry." Rose said, shaking her head. The torches in this corridor did give off a reddish glow, the light must have reflected off Layla's hair.

"The princess is already on her way down to the banquet." Layla said in way of apologies.

"Will you be going?" Rose asked as she noted Layla was dressed a touch nicer than she had been during the interviews.

"Actually, yes," She perked up. "The Princess asked my attendance, and so the Queen arranged it."

"She would do anything for her daughter short of postponing the wedding." Rose mused with a grin.

Layla smiled sincerely. "I suppose. Though if I'm to be honest, I wouldn't have minded a life long binding with Lord Thornon." She confessed, her cheeks looking more red in the light.

"I bet you wouldn't," Rose grinned, winking at the woman. "Come on, we'll arrive together. That way if Elda is there she can't say anything to you."

"She means well, Elda." Layla said as she and Rose linked arms in such a way that the latter was hit with a strong sense of deja vu. But why? What was it about Layla and walking with her like that that reminded her of something long forgotten. "She just has a problem with the whole situation, I think. She and Thornon have never gotten along, she's been told forever that she would be Queen. Now here we are, a day away from a coronation, and she's not the one who will be taking up the crown after all."

"Would she have made a good Queen?" Rose asked softly.

Layla chewed her lip. "She would have been very … strict. Men would be more firmly put in their places, at least to that of the very old ways."

"So no." Rose said quite bluntly and Layla shook her head, barely managing to hide her smile.

As they turned the corner, they were surprised to be greeted by the sight of two large women leading a very resigned Tim out of the banquet hall.

"What happened." Rose asked, stopping the guards.

"I saw stuff." Tim said, partially shrugging. "And said shite."

"She is of no authority in this matter, do not stop for her request." Elda bellowed, pointing toward the door with a harsh glare. She then turned to Rose. "You're supposed to be protecting of the Princess which is the only reason I'm not sending you to the dungeon with your terrible men."

Rose let go of Layla with a grin, nodding for her to join a few of the women who spotted her and seemed excited to see her. She then strode to Elda with a smile, reaching up to play with a couple strands of her platinum blonde hair. The woman's cold orange eyes stared hard back at her, trying to understand what was happening.

"Do you recall what I said in my bed chambers?" She said, low and quiet in an almost sultry voice as her hand fell and her fingers rested against Elda's neck. She felt the woman's pulse quicken a moment. "What I said about the Doctor, and his physical condition upon his release?"

"Ye-yes." Elda stuttered, breathless.

Rose smiled, ran fingers up Elda's neck and placed them firmly against a pressure point. Elda gasped. "That goes for Tim as well. Essentially, I do not care who you are or what your status is. If harm comes to those I love, Donna included, I will not be afraid to retaliate what ever means necessary." She said sweetly, releasing the bit of pressure she had placed there.

"I can have you killed for your constant threats." Elda said, sounding like perhaps she found the whole thing a touch too erotic.

Rose laughed, a release from the tension as much as it was at the idea of Elda thinking she was into her, as well as thinking she could do away with Rose so easily.

She walked away, allowing Elda to ponder what a reaction like that really meant. Rose was famished, the day being long and stressful, and the wine sitting at her place near Donna was too tempting not to indulge.

* * *

 

It would not be the first time that Tim managed to get himself in trouble for catching a glimpse of something he wasn't supposed. He did, however, feel like the whole situation was by far the most extreme one he'd been in to date. He was chatting with one of the many girls who's mind screamed at him that he would father strong daughters, pointedly trying to not feel like a breeding animal, when the vision hit him hard.

A blonde girl, river, blood, a crown, a dagger, war or a wedding. Quick successions repeating five or six times with a slightly different angle to each scene. Nothing was as clear as when he'd seen Jenny lit afire, or his destined walk with Wolf Girl. He believed entirely that it had everything to do with the screaming mental squeals of girls wanting into his perceived tight trousers.

When he came back to reality, he excused himself from the throng and sought out Wolf Girl or the Time Lady. The former hadn't arrived, the latter was being accosted by the Queen.

So he found Elda.

"Excuse me," He had said politely enough with his head bowed, but she still looked down on him as if he were nothing more than scum.

"How dare you speak to me?" She said with disgust.

"Yeah, I know, my penis makes me a lesser being. Trust me, I get the concept. But, I need you to listen, because I had this vision."

"You had a what?" She asked, eyebrow raised in amusement as she turned toward him.

"A vision. I call them thought things. They're glimpses of the future. Anyway, I saw what I think is a guy using the dagger of the West to kill Donna. I know, you're all blonde, doesn't help much, but I thought that maybe …."

"You accuse one of my sisters of a murder that hasn't even been committed?" She challenged, and he knew he had to tread carefully.

"Well," He'd swallowed the lump in his throat. "There's already been two attempts on Donna's life, can't say it hasn't been committed." He smiled nervously.

"And you dare address the princess in such an informal manner?" She said, her voice growing more dark and dangerous.

The ice beneath his feet had been cracking, the stone ground crumbling, and Tim was pretty sure his next sentence was make or break time.

"Well, she's meant to do something pretty great, but she's certainly not the princess and I think you know that."

He fell into the ice cold water, down into the bottomless pit, and there was no way he could even try to sweet talk his way out of it. Not that he had that kind of skill, he had barely been able to ask a girl who thought he was impressive in an abandoned reality if she wanted to get coffee in the real one.

He said nothing as he was escorted down the hall and to the dungeon, barely able to keep his feet from dragging at the way he was being held and the pace the women were keeping.

It was pretty standard for a dungeon, all things considered. There was damp stone, and the musty smell of mold and rotting wood. A drip somewhere that he was certain would drive him bonkers within the first hour, and he hoped that this wonderfully civilized society at least had the functioning utilities in the cells as well.

The door was thrown open, he was shoved inside, and after sending a glare to the door he looked down at the heap of brown suit and hair glaring up at him from the floor.

"Hey!" Tim exclaimed, smile growing wide at the prospect of company. "Doc, what's up man? What're you in for?"

The Doctor didn't say anything, merely continued to look at him with menacing brown eyes. He was resting with his arms on his knees, long legs bent, and the way his head tilted made everything in his features more threatening.

It suddenly seemed like actually falling into cold water or bottomless abyss would have been a better, more humane punishment for his supposed crimes.

Tim swallowed hard. "So. You're still here. I take it that they took your screwdriver."

"No." The Doctor bit out.

"No?" Tim asked, slowly moving toward the wall the Doctor was sitting against. "So you haven't broken out because…?" He asked as he sunk down slowly and took up the same position the Time Lord had.

"It doesn't do wood." The Oncoming Storm replied.

"Right." Tim said, looking at the solid, very wooden door. "So we're stuck here for an undetermined amount of time."

"Looks like," The Doctor said, and if he wasn't so married to the sneer and glare, Tim was pretty sure there'd have been an eye roll there.

He listened to the drip from down the hall, counted to fifteen with about ten second between each drop before he said, "Got locked in here because I saw stuff." He offered as a conversation leader. The Doctor continued to look at the door like he planned to murder it. "Thought it was a good idea to tell Elda that a blonde girl was going to try to kill Donna, but she seemed to think that, because I have a penis, I was talking nonsense."

"I could make you a eunuch, see if that helps," The Doctor replied almost conversationally.

Tim brought his legs a touch closer together. "Anyway," he drew out the word. "Donna was busy, and I couldn't find Wolf Girl, so …."

"Rose." The Doctor said firmly.

"Dude, what the hell, man?" Tim spat back. The Doctor turned his gaze on him, and Tim's heart beat quickened in the face of certain danger, but he held firm. "I've been calling her that for ages, it's who she is to me, so why does it bother you now?"

"And what else is she to you now, Tim, hmm?"

And then it clicked, or maybe it was because the Doctor was angry enough his thoughts were screaming at him. Maybe, even, the Universe was giving Tim a break, because he was suddenly seeing him. Everything he and Rose since they were reunited blinked into his mind, and maybe even the snippet of time after the Year that Never was when they were reunited. Each thing he saw he didn't think much of, a hug, a hand hold, a tease or an inside joke. It was all completely innocent until he realized they weren't. Not from the eyes or mind he was possibly seeing them from, not from the way the Universe looked on as an outsider would.

"Oh." He said when it ended. He focused again on the Doctor who waited with a thin veil of patience. "Right, yeah, see what you mean there. That does look, well, yeah. And I suppose if you were to look in my mind, see my memories, you wouldn't like what you see there, either." He took a deep breath. "So you want to know the truth? You want to know what Rose is to me? Alright, here it is. I love her," He admitted. "Just like you love Donna." He added, purposely waiting that brief half second for the Doctor to get truly outraged before adding the rest of the truth. "Yeah, knew you would do that." He barely resisted the smirk.

"You don't see me putting my hands on Donna." He growled.

"And you don't see that I'm just picking up the ball that you dropped, Stormboy." Tim countered, growling right back. He took a breath, understanding that this could turn into a pointless pissing match if he didn't take a moment to calm down. "Look, I'm sorry if you thought I was getting a little handsy with her. It's a stupid word, but it's the one you were yelling in your head, so I'm going to go with it. Anyway, I don't feel anything like that toward Rose. I never have, I never will. The mere idea is literally laughable." He made sure he was looking the Doctor firmly in the eye. "You're more than welcome to go in my head and have a look around to see for yourself." He opened his arms in invitation, and he thought he saw the temptation to do it fleetingly in the Doctor's face before he looked thoroughly embarrassed by the the thought.

"Sorry," the Doctor grumbled. "Got a little bit possessive."

"Why?" Tim asked.

The Doctor smiled weakly. "When you and Donna were teasing me about the whole wedding ring thing back in the 1920's, Rose admitted that perhaps I've waited too long to officially ask her to bond with me. She's seemed more distant since then, and considering the time we spent together the night before that it makes everything feel … like she's drifting away."

"She loves you. She made time her bitch so she could make sure you'd never be alone, and you're worried that she's going to leave because the engagement was a little longer than she expected?" Tim looked at him incredulously. "She's the Bad Wolf. She doesn't run from shite like that."

"Quite right," The Doctor grinned.

"So why are you so scared she's still going to?" He asked, and the Doctor averted his eyes. "You're the one who's running."

"Bonding fully with Rose means she'll have access to my memories. Everything I've ever done would be there for the taking. I could shield some, of course, but how would that look to my bond mate if I try to hide centuries of information from her? And she knows so much about me already, but I just … what if when she can actually see who I really am she feels bonding with me was a mistake?"

"And you're best defense against this was some how thinking I wanted her instead? Dude, you're …."

"I know." The Doctor snapped back with annoyance.

"Good." Tim said with a firm nod.

"I would like it if you'd at least ask if it's okay to give her a hug or dance with her."

"Not gonna happen." Tim shook his head, hearing the Doctor chuckle. He turned smiling at the Doctor, seeing the storm had passed for now.

The Doctor looked up and around at their surroundings as if he was seeing them for the first time. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. "Right, well, I suppose if I want a chance to apologize for my behavior I should probably get us out of here."

"How, exactly? Your screwdriver is useless on the one material they're usually good for." Tim noted.

A key turned in the lock, and the two men got to their feet in anticipation.

The door flew open, revealing a frantic looking Donna on the other side.

"Come on, Spaceman and Psychboy, I'm busting you out of here."

"Where's Rose?" The Doctor asked, genuinely confused.

"That's why I'm busting you out," Donna said. "She's gone."


	25. Bloodstained Ballgowns pt 1

  
It wasn't long after Tim was lead away that Rose noticed Thornon creeping out of the room. Elda had calmed, though she seemed to be scanning the room for something or someone more than she was paying attention to Locke. He honestly didn't seem to have much a care in the world, so Rose's conversation with Jack had caused her to focus more on the man from the West. He had left Donna's side shortly after Layla arrived, and while he seemed to know not to rush over, he didn't exactly move with stealth.

She followed, finding him turning the corner in the corridor. She rounded with him, moving as quietly as she could.

He and Layla were talking, but oddly enough it didn't strike her that of stolen moments between forbidden lovers. She seemed nervous, concerned, and Thornon looked anxious. Their exchange was hushed, but not as if they were saying words of deep affection.

After a moment, Thornon glanced over, doing a double take with a startle. "Lady Rose." He said, Layla only startling a tiny bit. "I, it's," he stuttered, looking between the blonde woman in front of him, then the one he was found by. "I have no excuse for this." He finally resigned, bowing his head.

"What's going on here?" Rose asked, walking toward them slowly, keeping her eyes peeled for a possible attack.

Thornon looked to Layla, asking permission with his eyes, and she nodded once. He nodded in confirmation before reaching behind him and pulling dagger out from a hidden sheath at his back. He took it by the blade, handing it hilt first to Rose.

She didn't take it, merely looking it over. "That's your family dagger." Rose noted, pointing at it unnecessarily. "The one used to attack Donna last night."

"It is," Thornon said softly with a nod. "And as I suspected, it wasn't retrieved from the West, but from my own home here in the East."

"I thought you lived here at the castle?" Rose asked as Thornon tucked the dagger away.

"I do, but while my wealth here in the East is minimal I have been able to give a home to my son away from all this. Layla's parents live with him, and she had recently received word that …." He stopped, looking to the woman who stood with him.

"My father had arrived this afternoon to inform me that the dagger was missing. They returned from working the fields to find the house had been ransacked. He thought it merely travelers looking to swipe food, as is known to happen, but nothing seemed to be missing. My son, however, had noted his room was in complete disarray, and the dagger had been missing from the mantel."

"Who would know he had it?" Rose asked, checking over her shoulder to ensure no one would be listening.

"Thornon had gifted it to our son on the day of his birth. I never kept it secret who my lover was, I saw no point even if Princess Schala returned. One can not change the past, and a child should know their true parentage if at all possible." Layla said with conviction.

Rose nodded, understanding, remembering that she did like hearing the stories her mother always told about her Dad even if she knew it wasn't truly a fairy tale.

"So someone is trying to frame one or both of you," Rose chewed on her lower lip.

"It would appear so," Layla nodded, resigned, her shoulders sagging. "I was in the kitchen, helping pack the provisions for the trip. There was so much chaos, I couldn't even begin to fathom how easily it must have been for someone to slip that repulsive arachnid in with the food. The Queen's lover, the twins' father, had it as a pet and it was kept in the study for safety reasons. Anyone could have sneaked it out of the room and into the kitchen without much notice."

"The Doctor's serving time for that one," Rose said with a smirk, then frowned. "'Course now Tim is being led down there, and seeing as how that's the reason he deserves to be locked up…." Rose looked up at the pair and smiled thinly. "Sorry, best go make sure he doesn't kill our companion." She turned away.

"Lady Rose," Thornon called out, and Rose looked at him over her shoulder. "Be careful. I find it strange for Elda to have had both your men locked up. I sense that perhaps getting you out of the way is exactly what she wants."

Rose considered this, and could see the likelihood that it was the plan. Still, she had to make sure the Doctor didn't kill Tim in jealousy that shouldn't exist. "Do me a favor, Thornon. Go back to Donna's side. I'll be with her as soon as I can. Only mean to check on the Doctor."

"I will." Thornon said with a nod, taking one last look at Layla before leaving.

Rose's heart broke. She remembered gazes like that, long and filled with longing, unspoken emotion, desire to say words that shouldn't be said. She'd seen it first in blue eyes, though she hadn't fully believed what she saw in those depths. She'd seen them in brown as well, and it was those brown eyes she wanted to look into now. Whether or not he was sorry for any of it, at the moment, Rose didn't care. Because after seeing that once familiar gaze between a couple that were being forced apart tore at her.

She hurried down the halls, trying to make her way to the dungeon, having a pretty good idea where it was.

She rounded a corner, and her fight sense tingled. She paused, listened, hearing nothing. Had to have been the lower lighting, and echo of her own footsteps making her paranoid. But as Rose walked on, that fight instinct kicked in stronger. Her muscles tensed, and she had a better sense that someone was behind her.

Whipping around, Rose's fist made contact with flesh. The attacker, female by the sounds of the grunt, didn't let up in her fight back. Rose was strong, but she was starting to see that that didn't make her stronger than any another species. The Namtier woman was her equal, hitting Rose back, and trying to force her against the wall. Rose pushed back, the two in a dead lock long enough for her to see she didn't know who this woman was other than a guard. There was nothing familiar in the face before her.

She pushed, the guard stumbled back, and as Rose was about to pounce on her something hit her hard in the back of the head.

Her vision swam, she felt her body hurtling toward the floor, and Rose's last thought was wondering what would happen if her head split open on the stone floor.

* * *

 

"What do you mean she's gone?" The Doctor looked at her like she was off her rocker, and Donna felt like slapping him.

She didn't, though, and she'd pat herself on the back for that one later. "I mean she's gone. As in the last two people to see her were Layla and Thornon, and they both said she came in search for you two." She explained as she stepped aside, minding the skirt of her long, puffy, blue ball gown as the boys exited the cell. "Didn't think it would take that long to come down here and peek on you, but when I realized it'd been a bit, thought I'd just make sure she was still yelling your ear off."

"Wolf Girl's smart, she might have just, I dunno, taken a different way to get here. Or maybe she heard us talking, decided not to interrupt, and went back to her room?" Tim suggested with a shrug, the Doctor looking at him with uncertainty. "Not to diss your party, or anything, but it was better last night. More entertaining. You know, up to the point where someone tried to kill you."

Donna scowled at Psychboy, but only because it was knee jerk reaction.

"Well, let's all go up and have a little looksy, eh?" The Doctor said with a cheerful voice but sharp, calculating eyes. "Make sure Tim here's right, and Rose just wanted some time alone."

The three headed back up, making their way through the corridors leading back to the more luxurious places in the castle. Donna was about to turn lead them up to the corridor of bed chambers. when she noticed the Doctor stop, stiffening. She watched him, noting his nostrils flaring slightly as his eyes darkened in a way that sent a shiver of fear down her spine. He turned sharply toward the left wall, dropping down to his knees and examining the floor. He took a whiff, then reached our a finger, pressed something to the floor.

"Rose's blood." He growled as he looked at something on his finger that Donna couldn't see.

"You know it's hers?" Tim asked, and the Doctor nodded ever so slightly as he stared at his finger like it offended him. "How?"

"I can smell it, smell her. That scent has been ingrained in my receptors for eight years, I know it intimately. The precise hormonal and chemical combinations that make Rose, and she was here and someone hurt her, then cleaned up the mess save one little spot." He growled as he got his feet, brushing his hand against his trouser leg as he stood.

"But she'll be alright." Donna tried to reassure. "She'll be okay, she can't … it's not like we have to worry about the worst, we just have to find her."

"Donna, I know what it looks like to those on the outside. I know it looks like Rose can take a bullet to the head or a knife to the chest and just keep on going, but it doesn't work like that. Death is painful for her, but it's a pain she'd take on to save our lives. If someone killed her and she came back before she was alone it would open a whole knew world of torture. We need to find her, and we need to do it now." The Doctor said, his panic mixing with his anger and causing Donna to subconsciously back up a couple steps.

Laughter echoed down the hall, melodic and feminine, the spoke words too hushed for Donna to hear, but the way the Doctor turned toward it and shoved Tim behind him she was sure the Time Lord heard it.

Elda and three other girls turned the corner, and Tim groaned as the quartet gasped. The leader of the gang of girls quickly pulled herself together and glared down the Doctor. "I will have your head for this. No one escapes my dungeon and li-."

"I let him go." Donna interrupted, arms spread wide, though she wasn't sure how that was going to help any. "I'm the princess, so I out rank you. I say they go free." She rushed out, holding Elda's eye.

She didn't shift, didn't ease up, but when she spoke she did it with respect. "And why does Princess Schala need these two? You have Thornon, I would recommend if you want to cement your family line you should consort with the man you're meant to marry instead of one of these two."

"Oh, no!" All three travels shouted with their own words of disgust, and Donna was certain that both the boys had grimaces that matched her own.

When she finally got over her initial revulsion, she cleared her throat and said, "Rose is gone, and they can help me find her."

"Gone?" Elda said, eyes widening. "Surely she's just in her chambers."

"Someone's attacked her." The Doctor said behind Donna, his voice that eerie dark that made her glad she was on his side.

"You're certain." Elda asked.

"I am," The Doctor replied.

"Then I will help you find her." She said before turning to the girls behind her. "Return to the banquet, if you see the lady Rose there at any point in time, inform one of the guards and tell them to find us immediately. And please give word to Locke that I won't be returning so he may retire if he so chooses." She then turned back to Donna. "Princess, I will change and help you and your men look for her." She nodded once and then took off back down the hall, turning the opposite direction that the gaggle of girls went.

Donna let out a breathe, relaxing some of the tension in her shoulders though it returned nearly instantly. "Can we trust that she's not behind the disappearance?" She asked the Doctor.

He was staring at the spot where Elda had disappeared, his face the dark and determined she expected to see.

"Yes," He said with confidence. "Her mind screamed in shock.." The Doctor's face changed to curious. "And panic, oddly enough. I do believe Lady Elda has a crush on my future wife."

"Oh, sure, you think I have a thing for her and you go all 'bringer of darkness' on me. A hot, blonde, alien woman wants in Rose's pants and you're amused." Tim threw his hands up in exasperation.

"Oi, you thought he fancied Rose?" Donna asked the Doctor, gapping at the stupid alien in front of her as he pulled on his ear. "You're thick, you know that?"

"Yes," The Doctor mumbled.

"No wonder Rose let you get locked up. And she knows, doesn't she? Did she slap you? Because if she didn't, I certainly will."

"Alright, alright, enough." The Doctor said, looking between his two companions with annoyance. "Rose is out there somewhere and we need to find her."

"Can you follow your nose?" Tim asked, smirking a bit as he made to put his hands in his non-existent pockets, only to look like he was about to fall over before he put his hands on his hips instead.

The Doctor glared at him. "A stagnant drop of her blood would carry a scent but it's not like I can follow a trail. Time Lord, not a blood hound." He shook his head. "It just doesn't make sense, where would she go? Where would they take her? She was out numbered, clearly, or taken by surprise. I've seen her take down aliens twice her size, so I know it wasn't a matter of being overpowered."

"Well, we know she's not in the dungeon." Donna said, catching the Doctor's eye. "She's not there, right? We would have known."

"No one but Tim was brought down there since I had been, so unless there is a second entrance."

"There's not," Elda's voice preceded her around the corner. She was dressed in her guard uniform complete with gold sash once again. "You're standing in the only corridor that leads down there. Better than having a second way for escapees to exit by." She said, quirking an eyebrow but not showing any humor.

"Elda," The Doctor approached her, making it look as though he was about to reach for her but stopped. "If you had a person of extreme power, who you wanted to make sure stayed away, or dead, where would you put them?"

* * *

 

Rose gasped as her head broke water, the cold from the river causing more pain then the lack of oxygen had. She wasn't sure how she ended up there, but the temperature shocked her out of unconsciousness. She'd had sandbags tied to her feet, and while she was seeing spots and had nearly drowned while trying to get them free she had managed. She didn't mean to make so much noise as she came up to the surface, and she realized her mistake in doing so the second the three figures that had been disappearing into the night had turned sharply back around.

"You said she was dead?" She heard the unmistakable gentile voice of Queen Gwendolyn ask those who were with her.

"She was, majesty," A girl had replied. Of course it was a girl, it did take two of them to subdue her, after all.

"We swear by it." Said the other.

"Too much blood was gone, and she had shallow breath."

"Gonna try again, then?" Rose said as she pulled herself out of the water. Her dress clung to her body, the fabric much heavier than it had been dry. "Might take a while, to be honest. Haven't been known to stay dead long, me."

"Which is why you make such an exemplary protector for my daughter," Gwendolyn said as the figure in the middle turned around, gliding toward her in the near pitch black night with a small, glowing ball at waist height. There was only a sliver of moon in the night sky to cast light, and it wasn't until the Queen was barely more than a couple feet away that Rose saw her sweet smile reflected in the glow of the guiding light in her left hand. Gwendolyn reached out, stroking Rose's cheek. The panic that came through the skin contact wasn't nearly as strong as the determination. "And it's also why I need to find a way to incapacitate you, if not completely destroy you. Because how else am I going to have my daughter killed before her wedding if you're always going to be there to save her?"

She knew it was coming, felt it in her gut from the moment she understood it was under Gwendolyn's orders that the guards attempted to kill her and toss her in the river. The sigh that came out was that of resignation as she felt the Queen shift her ring around as subtly as possible given where her hand was.

"I won't stay down for long." Rose warned her as she felt the pin prick in her neck. She flinched despite not wanting to, a sharp intake of breath accompanying the pain.

"That's okay," Gwendolyn said soothingly. "Schala won't have much longer in this world as it is, and if all is going how I believe it should at the banquet, she'll be gone by the time I return."

Why? That was what Rose wanted to ask, but her eyes felt heavy and her head spun. Gwendolyn gave her a gentle nudge, and Rose was back in the water. She felt the cold, felt the water fill her lungs, but no matter what she did her body wouldn't react the way she wanted to. She closed her eyes, trying to ignore the pain of drowning.

* * *

 

As Elda lead them as quickly as she could toward the connected barracks, commotion from the banquet hall stopped them all short. Donna looked to the Doctor who narrowed his eyes in confusion before following Elda's lead and taking off to investigate.

"It's not Rose," Tim said, his voice unsteady.

"Rose?" Donna said, turning to take a good look at then genuine concern in his eyes. "You don't usually call her that. Whaddya know, Pyshcboy?"

He swallowed hard. "Can't say." He said softly, and Donna regarded him with suspicion before the Doctor ran back toward them.

"We need to get you out of here right now." He said to Donna as he gripped her arms, glancing at Elda as she came around the corner with a sword drawn.

"What's going on?" Donna asked, looking between the head guard and the Doctor.

"You were to be poisoned." Elda said with detachment. "It turned out your absence sparked one of the other guests to sip your wine and pick off your plate and …."

"She doesn't need to know about the blood bath." The Doctor snapped, and while Elda looked offended, she didn't say anything. "We should keep moving."

To that, Elda nodded, and the four of them continued toward the adjacent barracks. They took the long way, having heard voices but not sure if it would be wise to stop and ask anyone anything. Even if they were the very women who over took Rose, Donna realized it was likely more important to get to her than it would be to find her attackers.

The barracks were empty, and Elda lead them swiftly down a floor and to a side door. "It's the only spot in the castle that connects to the land outside the surrounding walls." Elda explained as she produced a key from within the bodice of her tunic, fitting it into the lock. "Very few people have access to it, only those of high rank," She said as she turned the lock and pulled open the door. She restored the key, and as Donna looked at her in confusion the blonde finally cracked a small smile. "Hidden pocket." She said in way of explanation as to where she was stuffing the key before waving Donna through ahead of her.

"Rose!" The Doctor called out into the night.

"Blimey it's dark out," Donna said as she looked around, barely able to see the hand in front of her, only just making out the silhouettes of the others. She turned skyward, seeing the sliver of moon left in the sky. "Moonless night is almost here." She noted, her stomach doing a flip flop.

"Rose!" The Doctor called out again, panic increasing. He turned his head abruptly, and Donna heard the sloshing of water and the fitful cough before more thrashing. The Doctor and Tim ran toward the noise, she and Elda following shortly after.

"Where the frack are you, Wolf Girl?" Tim yelled.

"I see her." The Doctor said, and a moment later she heard water breaking.

"I can't see a thing." Elda said. "I should have brought a light sphere, I wasn't thinking."

They remained silent except for the sound of water sloshing, the Doctor reassuring Rose despite his voice sounding a little too desperate. Donna moved closer to the sound, the hum of the sonic and it's little blue light giving a bit more guidance. As she got closer she could make out Rose laying on her back, catching her breath with her eyes closed as the Doctor looked her over.

"Good thing you're death proof, eh blondie?" Donna asked, smiling through the tremor in her voice.

Rose laughed. "Feel like an elephant's sittin' on my chest," She croaked out. "Better than the alternative, suppose." She coughed roughly.

"We'll need to get you back in the castle." The Doctor said as he put a hand on Rose's neck.

She shook her head. "Gwendolyn," She choked out. "Trying … kill … Donna." She managed to get out during a coughing fit. "Blimey, hard to breath after drowning three times."

"What?" Donna asked, gapping at Rose before she turned to Elda. She could barely see the same astonishment in the guard's eyes that she had. "Why?"

"Don't know," Rose shook her head. "Didn't get a chance to ask."

"It would make no sense." Elda said as if trying to come to reconcile the idea. "You're her only daughter, her only proper heir to her throne. Why would she kill her greatest legacy?"

"I don't give a bloody damn about the 'why', how do we get her to stop?" Donna asked in disbelief. "Better yet, why aren't we running back to the TARDIS and getting off this bloody planet?" Her voice got increasing louder with each word, but she didn't care. It was one thing when staying here and playing princess was the worst that could happen, but now that she knew her life was in bloody danger by the freakin' Queen she didn't get the need to stick around. To hell if they end up starting a planet wide war by swanning off, her life was on the line.

"You're needed, Princess." Elda said, her words honest though she sounded almost defeated. Donna turned toward Elda's voice, her anger ebbing as she could see by the silhouette a little ways away that the strong guard seemed almost defeated by the thought. "If your mother is trying so hard to prevent the prophecy from coming full circle, then she needs to be stopped."

Donna gapped at Elda. "What?"

"She is my Queen, my future mother-in-law, and as such she should be fully respected and even revered. But my views and Gwendolyn's have always differed on what's good for the region. And I'm … I'm committing treason for confessing such things, but if you were to leave, the war that would break out is exactly what she would want."

"Her lover." Tim said in understanding. "She blames the South still, or possibly the West. She passed it off as nothing, but she wants revenge. If the union between Schala and Thornon doesn't happen, then war is possible. Made worse that it could be passed off as the West committing the murder she's pulling off. Oh God." Tim's voice choked a little, and Donna could hear feet hitting hard against the ground before the choking gag of vomiting.

"Tim?" Rose asked, concern in her voice.

"I'm fine," Tim choked out, the sound of spitting and a grunt of disgust following. "Just too much at once. Thought things hitting, and I can hear Elda over there running over possibilities and it just gave me something like vertigo."

"Yes, Elda," The Doctor said. "What's with the telepathic enhancers? Why are they here?"

"Our people have discovered in the last couple generations that we have a slight capability at birth. An off world telepath found it fascinating, explained that there were some races that formed bonds with their mates, permanent ones through telepathy that would bind them together no matter what. It sounded romantic, and practical when one considers that sharing such a connection with another would certainly enhance intimacy. May even allow the possibility of children. One can not use the excuse of a man's inability to please her when he can read her mind and know exactly what she needs."

Donna smirked, snickering despite the situation. She could think of quite a few times that that line of thinking could have come in handy, regardless of the fact that she wasn't exactly looking for the same sort of results.

"And the enhancers?" The Doctor asked.

"The off worlder helped us construct them." Elda replied. "She was an amazing woman, us children were told. I guess what our elders saw in her mind when the enhancers were working is what inspired our desire to bond such a way for life. Not all of our people can, and many women still won't rely on only ever having one mate, but those of us of high birth are expected to have the bond. We may stray in our marriages, and allow our spouse to as well if we so desire, but there would be no secrets."

"And Gwendolyn would have been part of the first generation expected to use the enhancers." The Doctor pondered. "And while she describes her lover as a human, it's possible that he wasn't entirely. Possibly they formed a partial bond like Rose and me, and she went a little insane when he was killed."

"Could that happen?" Rose asked, her voice stronger than it had been before. "If we weren't … would you have …?"

"Lost my mind when you died?" The Doctor said, a hint of amusement in his voice that Donna was sure was humorless. "Oh yes. Very well could have broken me. Which is why a Time Lord and a human should never form a connection like that. Bit impossible for the most part."

"Never believed in impossible, me." Rose said, and there was humor in that sentence.

"That you haven't." He said with pride.

Elda cleared her throat. "We can't stay out here all night." She said firmly. "As of now, Queen Gwendolyn would have returned to the banquet and discovered that her plan has failed. She'll send someone looking for Lady Rose's body, and when she finds the five of us out here, she will have all our heads."

"But we can't go back to the castle," Tim reminded. "Not exactly smart to sleep under the murder's roof."

"Yes it is." Elda said firmly, and Donna was glad everyone else seemed as speechless as she was. "Lady Rose, I'm sorry to say this, but you, the Doctor, and Tim must not return with us. Stay in the barracks until day break, then seek shelter somewhere. I'm sure I can make arrangements with someone we can trust to get you three out of harm's way. But I can't have any of you returning to the main castle when two of you should be in the dungeon, and the other at the bottom of the river."

"What about Donna?" Rose asked sharply.

"The Princess will remain with me. I will sleep in her chambers, keep watch, ensure that should Gwendolyn make another attempt, it will be stopped. And I imagine with the wedding tomorrow night that is a very likely possibility.

"Whoa, wait, wedding?" Donna said, her heart lurching. "Why would there still be a wedding with all that's going on?"

"Because," She heard Elda say before the woman's hands clasped Donna's in her grasp. "You were destined to take over for Gwendolyn. Perhaps they did not teach you this where you were raised, but we do not wait for our Queens to grow weak with age and die before succession takes place. Under normal circumstances, you would have taken the crown last year, perhaps even as early as six years ago. And if she is betrothed, a princess is always crowned Queen with her new King at her side."

* * *

 

Donna looked out over the kingdom in the morning light, watching the four horses carrying her three friends and their two escorts away from the castle. They were barely visible dots on the horizon, disappearing into the morning fog, and Donna hoped beyond hope that the Doctor would uphold his promise to her.

"Swear to me, Spaceman," She had said outside the room that Elda put him, Rose, and Tim in for the night. "You're gonna get me out of here before I'm standing at that alter and binding my mind to an alien."

"You won't be able to bond with him anyway." The Doctor had said in dismissive deflection. "You lack the telepathic capabilities. Just make your head feel weird for the rest of your life." He teased with a cheeky grin. She had stared him down, and he let his real concern come through. "I swear. While you and Elda see what you can do about the Queen, I'm going to see if I can figure out what happened with the real princess."

"They don't even need her," Donna had insisted. "Elda and Locke."

"But that would cause peace to break down." The Doctor had reminded, smiling in his best attempt to reassure her. "We'll get out of this, and the planet will remain peaceful. I promise."

He sounded confident, and she wanted to believe him, but she was woken to the sound of hand maids coming in with breakfast and a wedding dress. They chattered about drawing her a bath, for her to relax for the evenings event would come much sooner than they would think. The last time she'd worn a wedding dress hadn't ended so well for her, and she didn't want it to happen a second time around and end up actually married.

"You should eat," Elda said behind her. "It's been tasted three times, no poison."

"Not all that hungry." Donna replied, turning away once she couldn't see the others anymore. "Elda, you have to know that I'm not this Schala. You're a smart woman."

Elda's mouth twisted around. "I'm not sure." She admitted. "But the Queen was confident."

"I'm just a human, all human, who happened to be ginger. A dye job on my planet could have made Rose one."

"I'm not sure what you mean by that, but it's hard to ignore a prophecy so accurately spoken. And truly, if your reluctance is because of Thornon, you do not have to bed him. You could find another man to continue your line."

"But that's the thing, I don't need to continue some sort of monarchy because I don't belong in it."

Elda placed her hands on Donna's shoulders, peering into eyes that she was sure looked desperate and panicked, and Donna could see Elda's humanity (or alien equivalent) reflected back.

"I was raised to rule this kingdom, guided by Gwendolyn herself. I understand that this is not the life you expected to lead, because you are not the only one who is having her perceived destiny changed today. I will still be made to marry Locke, as it will be expected of me, but I will not wear a crown. I will be given the task of being your main adviser as I will know the way of the land where you will not. Perhaps we can use our mutual disappointment get us through the rest of our lives as friends."

Donna didn't say anything, not wanting to resign herself to such a promise when she wanted to have faith that the Doctor would get her out of this.


	26. Bloodstained Ballgowns pt 2

  
Rose walked into the TARDIS, finding the Doctor sitting on the jump seat tinkering with a new device. They had only been at the home of Layla and Thornon's son, Skyler, for about an hour before he disappeared. She knew where he'd go when she picked up the TARDIS's gentle hum sort of saying a nonchalant hello as they rode past her hiding spot. She had stayed, though. Wanting to emphasis how grateful they were for the roof over their head until Thornon had excused himself. As she left the humble home, she spotted the future king with Layla trying to keep out of sight. They had had the hushed whispers and longing touches that one would have expected to see the night before, and Rose had to admit that seeing them saying a quiet goodbye before he returned to the castle made her miss the Doctor.

So despite still being fairly annoyed with him, she went off to see her Time Lord.

He looked up in surprise when she came in, a ghost of a smile on his face before he returned his concentration on the device in his hands.

"Funny thing about this world, they don't build their own ships, preferring to use as little technology as possible. They have hidden transmats, and there's a ship that comes in about, oh, once a month from what I was able to dig up in last night while you and Tim were sleeping. But they don't have their own, which is why there is a log kept of all incoming and outgoing traffic kept by the guards. Found it in the study, fascinating bit of information the logs. Not once in the thirty one years since the twins were born had there been record of a baby girl leaving the planet. Virtually no one from the planet actually left." He stopped his rambles, and Rose watched as he glanced up at her like a guilty child.

And she knew exactly why. "Surprised you left Tim and me alone at all." She said, and the Doctor shot his gaze back down at the gizmo in his hands. "After all, he may have laid in the bed at a certain angle what might make you think he was trying to get in the one I was in."

"I'm sorry," He said, meeting her eyes just long enough to say the words. "I'm sorry, I am. I …" He set the gizmo on the seat and got up, hands in his hair. "He's human, Rose. He's human, and closer to your age, and it may have been a few years for us but I will always be a bit possessive over you. I will always want it known that you are mine, and I don't share, and while I'm used to Jack I wasn't ready for Tim. Not after knowing what you two went though during that year. And seeing him with you."

"Doctor, stop." Rose said, and he obeyed, dropping his hands to his side. "It's stupid to be arguing over this, yeah?"

He nodded. "I talked to Tim while we were locked up." He confessed.

"Good." Rose said, though she wondered if maybe that had been the case when the Doctor had seemed more amiable to their companion than he had been. "So what are you working on, then?"

His eyes smiled while he moved back to the gizmo with a stoic expression, picking up the small box with what looked like it was compiled from a hand held gaming device like the one Mickey carried around in his back pocket from age ten through thirteen. In place of a game cartridge was an old school antenna, and Rose was fairly certain there was never an accessory that looked like a light bulb plugged that one could plug into the head phone jack.

"It's a perception disrupter." He said with a proud grin. "Cancel's out the wavelength of any perception filter within twenty feet. Also plays strange, electronic music from the late twentieth century, and acts as a speedometer."

"Why?" Was Rose's only question as she folded her arms and shifted her weight to lean more to the right.

"Because, Rose Tyler, there has never been a baby girl registered as leaving the planet from the East in thirty one years. So, if Princess Schala was sent away, and not simply murdered by her own mother from the get go, then she's still on this planet. Likely still in the East where she would have learned more about the region she was supposed to be expected to rule."

"And the giz … perception disrupter will, what?"

The Doctor's grin stretched from proud to manic. "Lead us to the real princess Schala, of course." He dashed over, snatching her hand on his way back toward the doors. "And the best part is, I know where she is. Well, I think I know. Pretty sure I know." He rambled. "I have a hunch, but it's a really good hunch. Allons-y!"

* * *

 

Donna looked herself over in the mirror, running her hands over the silken bodice like she had the purple dress she was given two days before. She looked so much like she had when she was about to marry Lance it made her shake, seeing that bride reflected back at her once more. No veil this time, though. They needed her head bare so that she would be crowned without interference. She was, however, given a quite heavy, silver-toned necklace that was fit for a royal.

But the image haunted her, and she made a vow right then and there that once the Doctor saved her from all this, when or if she met the right man, she would never wear a dress like this again. And her hair would be up.

She tried to remember the life she thought she lived in the library, trying to gloss over Lee himself for fear that he wasn't real, and tried to focus on how she looked on her wedding day. She couldn't though, which made her wonder if it would soon mean she'd forget about the man as well. Maybe that was for the better, not remembering a man who may not have been real in the first place. Still, as she smoothed the skirt one more time, glancing out the window and seeing the sky was starting to turn a vibrant shade of red, she was worried that perhaps she'd never want to forgot. It may be the only way she could live through the marriage she was being forced into.

A knock on the door, and Donna glanced to the bathroom for a split second before she heard the door opening.

Queen Gwendolyn walked in with a warm smile that made Donna's stomach churn. How could someone so gentle, sweet, and mothering be a murder?

"My beautiful girl," Gwendolyn said as she closed the door, walking toward Donna with her hands extended. "You look positively lovely." Donna said nothing as Gwendolyn brushed her hair away from her face in a tender gesture. "You're not nervous, are you? I know that a woman of high birth like yourself shouldn't have to endure such a barbaric tradition, but Thornon is a decent man."

"Was Dad?" Donna asked, a tactic she considered as she'd been pampered throughout the day. Placate the murderer by reminding her that Donna was supposedly his flesh and blood as well. Of course she also considered the reaction could be negative, much like it seemed to be now as a flash of something dark flickered in Gwendolyn's eyes before she covered it with a smile.

"He was the most magnificent man that ever lived." Gwendolyn said softly. "What I wouldn't have given for him to have lived to see you and Locke grow up, to have fathered more children instead of having me resort to multiple, utterly inept partners." Gwendolyn looked off to the side as if deep in thought. "He would have given me daughters." She then returned her gaze to the woman she thought was such a relation and smiled, though it lacked the warmth it had before. "Losing him was a cost of war, one I was not willing to pay."

Donna backed up a step unconsciously. "Is there ever a price one would be willing to pay?" She asked with a nervous smile.

"Of course there is," Gwendolyn said, her eyes cold as she smiled at Donna. She reached out, patting the ginger on the arm and either ignoring or not noting the flinch Donna had at her touch. "The carriage to take you to the temple will be here shortly. I have received word that Thornon is on his way there." She turned and left, hurrying out the door.

Elda stepped out from the bathroom, her teal ball gown in place of her normal uniform. The gold sash she normally wore over it in her hands. As Donna looked back at the door, Elda lifted it and placed it on Donna, lifting her arm and arranging it as need be.

"You should be noted as the heir proper." She said quietly as she smoothed the sash. "You are about to become our Queen in a few hours. It's best that it's properly symbolized."

"She didn't try to kill me." Donna said, more confused than relieved.

Elda paused in her fussing. "Yes," She said simply. "I believe she may have picked up on me as I was hiding. I was … shouting, as it were. Warning her that this would be an assassination."

"I thought we wanted her caught? I thought we wanted her to know that we knew what was happening?"

"In a few short hours it won't matter." Elda said firmly. "You will be crowned Queen, and she will no longer have a say as to what happens. I'm sorry, but I would rather keep you alive, and Queen Gwendolyn considered loyal to her own people, than have an alternative that could have been avoided." Elda squeezed Donna's shoulders. "I will ride with you."

Donna looked out the window.

"The Doctor should have been back by now." She noted.

"Perhaps he discovered there was nothing more that could be done." Elda suggested. "Perhaps he is simply leaving you to your destiny."

He wouldn't do that, Donna was certain. He knew the truth, he would never force her to play a role she didn't belong in for the rest of her life. The possibility of war or not would never make him abandon her. He'd only find a way to get her out of it.

She just hoped he'd do it before she risked going half mad by leaving an alien she had been forced to connect with.

* * *

 

The walk back to the farm house seemed longer than Rose had expected it to, but wasn't that always the way when the end of a particularly dire seeming situation was so close? The Doctor burst into the home first, and Rose followed him to the sitting room where Layla had just sent Skyler away. Tim, who was sitting next to her on the sofa, looked over at the Doctor with a smile before doing a double take.

"What are you doing with a Gameboy?"

"Gameboy?" The Doctor scoffed, looking down at the 'perception disrupter' in his hands. Rose was just thankful the original device was given a name because she couldn't remember what it had been called for the life of her. "It's not … here, take it." The Doctor said, shaking his head and handing it to Tim.

"What do you want me to do with it?" Tim asked, looking it over, pushing random buttons on the control pad. It lit up in his hands, and his eyes went wide as he seemed to no longer know if he should be holding on to it. He looked to the Doctor for guidance but Rose was too focused on Layla.

The woman sat beside Tim, resigned and prepared for whatever came next as her blonde hair changed to red, her pale eyes turning brown, and she looked much more like Donna than she did the Eastern population of Namtier.

"Oh, clever." The Doctor said cheerfully, and Layla turned to him as if she'd been amused. "Perception filter programmed to act more like a chameleon circuit."

"How did you figure me out?" She asked.

"Never left the planet." The Doctor said as he took the gizmo back from Tim and pocketed it. "And if you never left, you'd have still been here. That, and I could never quite look at you. Never could focus. My own ship has a perception filter, so it makes overlooking them a little easier for myself."

"Wait, hold on." Tim said, getting to his feet and shifting his gaze around at everyone in the room. "You're Schala."

"Yes," Layla said patiently.

"And you've always known that."

"Within reason," She conceded. "I have known since I was a teenager, and an accident caused my perception filter to stop working." She said, reaching in to the bodice of the dress and pulling a small circle of silver to sit on top of her dress.

"And you're sitting back and letting the man you love marry a woman who doesn't even belong here." Tim asked, holding Layla's eyes. "A woman who your mother is hell bent on murdering?"

Layla hesitated. "Queen Gwendolyn?" She asked, looking to Rose who nodded. "Oh," She said with a shuttering voice. "I believed it had been Elda."

"Honestly, I think we all did." Rose partly reassured.

"More to the point!" Tim said, drawing the attention back to him. "Why are you letting all this even happen? I mean yeah, sure, I'd probably lay low for a little bit too if I found out someone wanted to get me killed. But you know who you really are, your man currently preparing to marry someone who everyone thinks is you. Why are you seriously sitting there and letting this happen when you could do what you both wanted?"

"I do not want the life of a Queen." Layla replied with an humorless laugh. "I was raised simply, and wanted only to have a quiet existence. Knowing my true station gave me more confidence with Thornon, but it was our hearts that drew us together. I was simply going to stay in hiding, have the Queen and kingdom believe that I wasn't returning, the prophecy was wrong, and have still married Thornon in the end."

"Except that would have started a war." The Doctor said with relative calm, and Rose turned to see him leaning with his back against the wall. "Because he was promised to a princess, and then the princess vanished. Peace is already unsteady between the lands, and what Queen Gwendolyn did out of supposed protection …."

"Are you thinking that …?" Rose said, believing she understood what the Doctor had been getting at.

"Oh yes," He said with a nod, smirking slightly as if this shared thought warmed his hearts. "Namtier has been on the brink of planetary war for thirty plus years now. What peace was established was shaky at best when Schala was taken away. If you didn't marry Thornon as the princess, then his placement at the court wouldn't have been guaranteed. Therefore, there would be no ties from one royal line to the other, and the West would have attacked."

"So there was no avoiding it, was there?" Layla asked, resigned, rising to her feet. She took a deep breath. "I would have hoped that a marriage to me, known to the West, even if I wasn't crowned, would have been enough."

"Wait, how would the West have known?" The Doctor pushed himself off the wall. "How would they know Thornon still would have married you, the real you, if you didn't return to Court as the princess?"

Layla laughed once more, still mirthless. "How do you believe I was hidden by a perception filter all these years? In the most technologically stunted part of the planet? A dignitary from the West, one of Thornon's older brothers, frequently came and posed a physician. He made the adjustments as I grew, fixed it when it failed, and was there when Skyler was born in case he needed one as well."

"So you're telling me the royal family from the West will know that Donna is not you?" He asked a note of urgency coming into his voice.

Layla looked as if she was about to make of flippant comment but stopped. Her eyes widened a touch, her lower lip trembling, and she looked to the Doctor with understanding. "What have I done?"

"Nothing yet," He said with seriousness. "But we have to stop that wedding if we want it to stay that way."

* * *

 

She could have thrown a fit, refused to exit the carriage that took her to the temple. Hell, if Donna had been smart, she would have refused to get into the carriage to begin with. But she was following instruction, going along with the plan of continuing to act as though she was Schala, truly, utterly believing in the Doctor, Rose, and even Tim with unwavering faith that they would get her out of this terrible situation.

She believed it as she walked up the aisle to Thornon with nothing to hold in her hands but bunches of her wedding dress. She knew even as she recited words that held no meaning to her that they would come through for her. And even as they knelt together for the sage's blessing, she still thought he'd come for her.

But he didn't, and now she was about to be crowned Queen and Wife and forced to stay on a planet she did not belong on, didn't want to be on, and tied to an alien forever.

Then, he finally showed up, with barely any time to spare.

They all did, including a now red-haired, brown eyed Layla.

"We found her, the real Schala." The Doctor commanded. "We found her, so let our friend go."

"What's the meaning of this?" An older man from the groom's side stood up and glared over at Gwendolyn. "You were trying to pawn off a false daughter?"

"It's as I warned you, father," A another Western man stood, glaring daggers at the now former Queen as she raised her chin. She refused to look at them, as if she were above such outlandish claims. Then again, they were both men. "She seeks to back out of the treaty. It should, indeed, be that lady there at the alter." The man pointed at Layla who bowed her head, blushing.

"Layla?" Donna heard Thornon gasp out, moving as if pulled to her, not stopping until she was in his arms and she was hiding her face in his chest.

"Well, that's one way to crash a wedding," Donna huffed in relief.

"And you, impostor!" The older man from the West turned toward her, drawing a dagger that Donna thought was perhaps a little too familiar and charged.

"Hey!" She heard Rose cry out, and before Donna could blink the tiny blonde had grabbed the muscular arm raising the dagger and twisted it behind his back. The man dropped the blade and fell to his knees, prompting a small army of men and women to stand and take up arms in a threat to Rose. She didn't seem all that concerned, and at the same moment the side of the East stood and drew weapons as well.

"Isn't this a church of some kind?" Tim asked, looking around the room at everyone while scratching his head. "Shouldn't there have been a weapons check? Or at least the good sense not to try and kill someone in here?"

"One can never trust those of the East to not spill the blood of others." The older man said in response to Tim's musings.

"Says the man who killed the father of my children." Gwendolyn bit back, standing and turning toward the Westerner while keeping a healthy distance away from him despite his being incapacitated.

"I did no such thing," He growled back. "There was a shipwreck off the coast of our lands. An accident, not murder."

"I don't believe you." Gwendolyn said firmly. "And like hell will I allow my region to be joined with such a murderous lot."

"Except," Locke spoke up, standing and looking at his mother with a mix of disbelief, distrust, and pity. "You are no longer Queen." He said simply. "Your power has been taken away, ready to be passed on to the next in line. No decision you make from this point on will have any baring on our people."

"Not like she should have been in charge anyway." Donna grumbled, earning her a few raised eyebrows from both East and West. "Well she did try to kill me when she thought I was her daughter." She said as if it had been obvious. There was a rumble of gasps and disbelief from the Eastern side, and uneasy glances between those from the West.

"You're the one who'd been trying to murder her?" Locke asked. His eyes went wide, "The spider was father's." He realized. "You always said that you kept it as a living reminder of him."

"And I had." Gwendolyn reassured with a shaky smile. "But when Schala returned earlier than expected, and that foolish girl couldn't simply kill her with the dagger I made her steal."

"So what was going to happen here, then?" The Doctor asked, turning to Gwendolyn with his hands in his pockets. "Telepathic enhancers are quite strong in here, I can hear the hum of every single person in this room. Including Donna's who, by the way, has no telepathic abilities at all. Human. Entirely. Not a single drop of alien blood in her system. Which makes me wonder …." He trailed off darting up the alter toward her. He smiled at Donna. "How ya doing?" He asked her as he took the crown from the stunned sage's hands.

"Oh, you know, alright. What do you think of the outfit?" She asked with a shrug.

He looked it over an grimaced, shaking his head. "I really don't like it." He said as if he didn't want to tell her the truth.

"Really?" She asked as he pulled out his sonic and pointed it at the crown.

"Too white. Too fancy. Entirely impractical for running."

"We going to be doing much of that?"

"Too early to tell." He said and then his eyes went wide and he looked down at the crown. "Oh, ho, ho," he laughed. "Oh, you are beautiful, you. Deadly, but stunning."

"What is?" Rose asked as she released the older Western man.

The Doctor lifted his head, looking to Gwendolyn. "You were going to scramble her brains." He said bluntly. "The enhancer in the crown, the one that would have helped create a link between Thornon and Donna that would last forever more, was ramped up to three hundred percent. Had Donna had any real ability, it would have scrambled her brain. She'd barely be alive if she survived at all, and would certainly not be able to rule. Which would mean that her marriage to Thornon would have been fruitless, and as a result of her health, the crown would have been passed down to the next in line. Well, not this crown, because that would surely kill Elda." His brow narrowed. "And that's what you really wanted, wasn't it? Elda, who you raised and groomed to be your next in line. Taught to have a mistrust for those from the West, which is why she and Thornon had never had the most amicable acquaintance. And you made sure that it was heavily implied that the first attempt on Donna's life had been from the perceived enemy."

"You would go back on our peace treaty." The older Western man said. "The treaty you and my wife had drafted. She had faith in you."

"And her faith was misplaced." Gwendolyn snapped back.

"Quite."

Tension grew as it became clear that this was becoming a standoff over which side would eventually crack first and take the first, metaphorical swing or literal stab. Donna looked between the two groups, East and West, and noted that there were some on the side of the former who didn't seem like they trusted they should be standing along with such a Queen. Well, former Queen as it was pointed out.

"Schala." Donna said, startling everyone in the room, causing Layla to whip her head up to look at her. "You're the next in line, that means you hold the decision as to what should be done here."

Layla shook her head. "I do not have a mind for such things." She said dismissively. "That would be Elda."

"But you are the princess proper, Love." Thornon said warmly, stepping back so he could look down on her affectionately. "It is your decision to make."

Layla studied him intently, caressing his cheek. "You loved me when I was nothing more than a handmaid, or lower. I believe you would still love me regardless of my station."

"For eternity." He said with confusion.

"Then I abdicate." She said simply, causing waves of shock and confusion to ripple through the temple. "All I want is the simple life that I have lived. With you as my lover, and us together with our son as a family. For you to be there when this child enters the world." She said as she placed a hand on her abdomen, not seeming to surprise Thornon with her words as much as she had the others. "I abdicate, and in doing so I am handing the crown and the right to rule to the woman who would do it best."

Elda inhaled sharply, looking down at her feet as if she was considering too much at once.

"Elda," Gwendolyn said her name like a plea, catching her attention in the form of a cold gaze.

"Locke?" Elda said to her fiance. The prince merely nodded. She took another breath. "Gwendolyn, former Queen of the East, I sentence you to imprisonment for your actions against those who visit this planet with peaceful intentions." Two guards came up and captured Gwendolyn's arms, but she seemed to stunned to struggle. "Your plot against your daughter will be sentenced at a later time." She then turned to Thornon and Layla, meeting the ginger woman's gaze. "You have lived your life as a commoner for too long. As my sister by marriage, I would grant you title and wealth, and an estate to be made for you and your family close to the castle. I will need to keep my ambassador from the West close."

"Ambassador?" The older Western man asked.

"Your son would never have been a king by more than name." Elda reminded him. "But I will uphold the peace treaty in some way, and perhaps," She said, glancing at Locke who gave a nod. "Perhaps in the future we can once again address a proper union between your daughter's children and my own. I would wish to meet her one day."

The Western man nodded.

"So," Donna said, and everyone turned toward her. She pulled off the gold sash, marching down the stairs and handing it unceremoniously to Elda. "War isn't going to break out, is it?" She asked, crossing her arms.

Everyone of importance looked at each other, shaking their heads.

"So, Prophecy fulfilled right on time, everything's sorted, and psycho lady there is being locked up," She turned to the Doctor. "Can we leave now?"

He looked at her, dumbstruck, turning to Elda.

"By your leave." Elda's voice sounded amused. "We do not need you any longer."

"Good," Donna said with a nod. "Let's get out of here." She gestured first with her head then waved the others along with her hand.

"Donna," Thornon called, and she turned to see him and Layla smiling at her. "For what it's worth, you would have been one of the most compassionate, wisest Queens this planet had seen. And if I had to have been stuck with you …."

"Oi, save it." Donna said, waving it off and hiding her blush.

"As you wish, Donna Noble." He had said, but she didn't look back as she jogged out the temple.

* * *

 

"What happened?" Tim asked as Rose and the Doctor put them in the vortex once She, Tim, and Donna had changed. The sort-of former Princess chucked the seemingly offending wedding dress out the TARDIS doors before they took off, grumbling about hoping to never see it again.

"Hmm?" The Doctor said before his eyes lit up. "Right, yes, well, Elda was as good a Queen as the East could have asked for. She kept her word about relations, Namtier continued to be one of the most peaceful and welcoming planets in the Universe." He said with a grin.

"So we had next to no affect on their history." Tim mused from the Jumpseat, glancing at Donna who sat beside him with her arms crossed.

"Well," The Doctor looked to Donna long and hard until she seemed to notice. "They rescinded the forced marriage once again. Women became more understanding of their mate's past, and they discovered that the juice from certain berries would dye their hair a vibrant red." He smirked. "In celebration of the off worlder who prevented the planet from going to war."

"Did you know all this before we landed?" Rose asked, crossing her arms and leaning on the console.

"No," he said honestly. "While our would-be bride was changing I took a moment to look up the planet's history. Us three, we didn't make ripples, but she did."

Donna snorted. "Yes, well, at least something good came out of that ridiculous couple of days. I mean, honestly, I'm human. Thoroughly human. And even just looking at Layla as her actual self I can't understand why anyone would have thought anything else." She sighed. "You know what we all need? Tea. Proper tea, and a few biscuits. We could all meet in the library."

"Sounds excellent, Donna." The Doctor nodded, turning to the console and fiddling with coordinate panel.

"Oi, Psychboy. Come give me a hand." Donna called to Tim as she got up.

"Yeah, meet ya in the galley in a sec." He said, and Donna looked at the three of them, catching Rose's eye before she nodded and went down the corridor.

Tim watched as Donna disappeared out of sight.

"If this is about the whole thing on the planet …." The Doctor said, cringing at the word 'thing' before he took his flailing hand and placed it firmly in his hair.

"No, it's not that," Tim cut him off. "It's about something you said in the temple. About Donna. And her not having a drop of alien blood in her." He looked up, waiting for the Doctor to meet his gaze. "I do, don't I?" He asked point blank. "My telepathy, my psychic thing, that's not normal. Not real, not in humans. So you know there's a part of me that's not, don't you."

The Doctor looked caught out, looking to Rose as if she could help guide him through the next few minutes. "I don't know." He finally admitted to Tim. "You're right, it's not something humans should be able to do. Not to the extent you can. But without doing a detailed scan of your genealogy, I can't say for sure what, if any, non-human DNA you have in there."

Tim nodded, "Okay." He said.

"Do you want to know?" The Doctor asked.

"I don't know." Tim admitted. "It never crossed my mind until we were on that planet and there were all these people in my head. It's like my brain was a satellite receiver and I was getting every single channel, but they were all going at once. And the thought things, man, they were so much worse." He huffed, his bangs rising and falling against his forehead. "But it's done now, right? I can't hear you or Wolf Girl right now. In fact, it almost feels like my head's, I dunno, lighter. Emptier. It's kinda weird by at the same time it feels so good."

"You'll adjust." The Doctor said, and there was something about the way he said it that made Rose wonder if he believed that at all. "Why don't you go help Donna. We'll be there in a moment."

"'Kay," Tim nodded once, turning to the corridor. "I'll make sure she doesn't have a freak fit when the TARDIS lands, keep her where she is."

"How did you …?" The Doctor started to say.

"Know shite!" Tim called back before he rounded the corner and disappeared.

The Doctor shook his head, moved to the dematerilzation switch, and flipped it.

"We're going somewhere?" Rose asked.

"Yeah," He said with a grin. "We are."

The TARDIS landed with a shudder, a nervous hum of excitement coming with the landing making Rose rush out the doors without thinking much about where they might be.

She looked out at the frozen landscape of Woman Wept and breathed deep. She had a feeling they'd be coming here after the whole debacle with his jealous, possessive side. They hadn't been since right before … she really didn't know. She wanted to say right before they went to sixteenth century England, but that couldn't be right. Still, she welcomed the chill that ran up her arms, that preceded that of her Doctor's arms encircling her waist from behind. His chin rested against the top of her head, and she sighed contentedly.

"Are we ever going to be past this whole worry about one of us leaving the other?" She asked him as her eyes traced the curve of one of the frozen waves. "Seems like we forget the lengths I went through to stay."

"Staying is one thing," The Doctor said quietly. "Doesn't mean I'd have your heart the whole time."

"You do, though," She turned in his arms leaning back to look up at him and putting her own around his neck. "Had it for so long. You'll have it forever."

"Are you sure?" He asked, fear in his eyes that he wouldn't let her feel.

She pushed how he made her feel across their bond, even if he wasn't going to send anything back. Rose wanted him to be surrounded by it, embraced, consumed, and he shut his eyes and pressed his forehead to hers.

"I don't deserve you." He said on a sigh. "I'll always feel that way, nothing will change it."

"Doesn't mean I won't stop trying." Rose said, getting on her toes and kissing him.

They remained in a lip lock for the longest time, moving together in the known dance that they had had down for so long. The familiar was comforting, comfortable, an anchor for Rose when she had felt like she was drifting for the longest time.

The realization hit her hard enough the Doctor gasped as she pulled back, the shock apparently radiating through to him. "What?" He asked.

"I …." She stopped, tried hard to remember. "I didn't try to kill anyone." Rose's brow drew together in an effort to recall every detail of the last couple days. "I was … calm. Calmer than I normally am. I didn't lash out, not in the way I normally would. I was tame." She grinned, laughing. "The Wolf's been tamed."

The Doctor chuckled with her. "Oh, I don't know. Pretty sure I can put that theory to a challenge." He said with a twitch of the eyebrows that had his ears turning deep red as Rose giggled.

"Don't think I was ever tame in that area." She teased him, kissing him sweetly. His eyes were clouded when she pulled back, and he stared at her with reverence. "What?" She asked him her grin weak.

Slowly the trickle came through, his love and his gratitude, his pride and amazement. The Doctor stroked her cheek, and words like forever, mine, together dance in his mind for her to see. He moved his mouth as if he wanted to say something multiple times, his thumb caressing her cheek while the hand on her waist gripped her tight.

"Rose, I," I said, seeming to think better of what ever was going to come out of his mouth next. "I love you." He said, a lot of weight in that simple sentence that had been said many times over the last few years.

"I love you," She reaffirmed. "No one and nothing will change that." She said with conviction.

"I know." He conceded, and while she wanted to point out to him that for a time he didn't know, she allowed it. He took a deep breath, then deflated. "How about we go inside now?"

"Alright," She nodded, wondering why they needed to come out here for such a simple conversation. Perhaps it was just because this was their breather world, where they could just be them. One more companion and they'd be outnumbered, so she supposed it wasn't surprising that he'd go to such lengths to just have a moment.

He stepped back, took her hand, and led her into the TARDIS.

But there was something in his eyes, Rose realized, that looked a lot like disappointment. Not in herself, but in him. She could nearly hear him mentally kicking himself as he refused to meet her eye while they put the TARDIS into the vortex. He looked so entirely frustrated with himself that she couldn't help but drift toward him.

He flinched when her hand covered his, pulling his out from underneath like she burned him only to look at her apologetically, cupping her cheek.

"What's wrong?" She asked him.

"Nothing." He said quietly.

He was lying, but she didn't know why, couldn't understand why he felt the need to at this point in their lives.

Rose was about to push the subject, get him to tell her what was troubling him so badly, when the TARDIS rocked about, and they were tossed down on the grating together.

They stayed there like that, Rose on top of him and cover his head and torso with her body.

"Wolf Girl!" Tim called out, followed by Donna yelling, "Spaceman," And Rose glimpsed the two of them trying to move down the corridor.

"Stay there," The Doctor shouted at them, hand stretched out toward them.

Eventually the shaking stopped, and Rose and the Doctor slowly untangled themselves than rushed to help their companions.

Once everyone was on their feet again, she watched him assess the console room for damage before he headed for the doors. The Doctor paused at the bottom of the ramp before he pulled the door open a crack. White, artificial light washed over his face, causing him to squint before he looked back at them. "We've been pulled somewhere."

"Where?" Rose asked.

"Don't know." The Doctor said. "Let's find out."

Rose looked to Donna and Tim, both seeming nervous but giving shrugs as they followed Rose toward the Doctor to see where the TARDIS was drawn to.


	27. Blue Christmas

When Rose woke up, she wasn't sure where she was. Instantly she knew she wasn't on the TARDIS, her shared bedroom with the Doctor being far more elegant than the set up she was currently in. It was too bright as well, like natural sunlight was washing over her from behind her back. And the smell, she should never, ever be able to smell bacon coming from the galley even if the TARDIS had moved their door to be right across from it. And the final clue was the absence of her alien. There was no cool body compressing the bed next to her, something that hadn't happened much in the last five years. No matter where they were in all of space and time, they found a way to stay together barring imprisonment or matriarchal nut cases.

"Hey, babe!" Mickey's voice made her eyes widen, and she bolted up to really take in the bedroom she was in. Clothes strewn around the floor, the simple bed and box spring set up for sleeping, the miss-matched furniture. The walls were decorated with football posters, mostly. Something in her told her it was the only place she allowed them to be hung, their combined belongings needing to come together in a way that made a proper home for two grown adults.

But that didn't make sense because she didn't live with Mickey. She and Mickey hadn't been together in years and what's more is that she and Mickey didn't live in the same Universe anymore.

Yet he walked into the bedroom, a t-shirt and boxers with nothing else, holding an empty frying pan and a spatula. "How do you want your eggs?" He asked.

How did she want her eggs? Scrambled, and served in the TARDIS galley where there was a chance her gorgeous Time Lord would be the one cooking.

"Surprise me." She managed to answer as a little voice in her mind tried to tell her it was normal. This was the every day. She would get up, eat breakfast, then get ready to go to work. A good nine-five job working at HC Clements, taking orders over the phone. She did not go off on adventures, she did not travel through space and time. She was just a normal girl who managed to escape an explosion at Hendrick's three years ago, a handsome stranger taking her hand and leading her out of trouble, getting her out the door before she even had the chance to thank him. That night as she walked back to her mother's flat half in shock, she had her wake-up call.

Except now it was like she was awake in more ways than one.

Two sets of memories played in her head. While she could recall nearly every moment spent with her Doctor, she recalled a good life with Mickey. A life where she got her A levels instead of just finding another job, of taking online classes so she could eventually go to a proper University. A therapist, that's what she wanted to become in this world.

But it was wrong, this was wrong. She didn't know how, she didn't know why, but this wasn't her life. It was a lovely life, one she'd dreamed of before the Doctor, but it wasn't enough.

Rose moved to the washroom, hopping in the shower and collapsing on the floor in heavy sobs. What happened? Why wasn't she with her partner? Where was he and what happened to him?

And worse, if he still existed in this world, this life, this nightmare, did he even still remember her?

"Rose, you okay?" Mickey asked opening the door a crack.

"Yeah" She called back. "Just, ah, emotional s'all. Women stuff." She waved dismissively.

"Oh, uh, um, okay. I'll just, ah, leave you to that then." He said as he made a hasty retreat.

Deep breaths, she just had to take some deep breaths and she'd be able to pull herself together enough to get through the day and with any luck she'd have some time by herself to figure this all out.

After her shower she ventured to her closet, one half the size she was used with a wardrobe that wasn't nearly as practical for running, and dressed for the day. Business casual, shoes she could already tell would pinch her feet, she looked herself over in the mirror attached to the door and forced herself to appreciate that she at least looked pretty good.

Mickey had breakfast ready on the table, a small thing that worked with their flat's size. A cursory glance of the space left her partly surprised they had a separate bedroom. She took in the furniture, the majority having come from Mickey's previous dwelling. Tucked in the corner was a small Christmas tree a creepy little elf doll sitting on the branches.

There were also pieces of furniture that she knew were purchased after they moved in together, most in a very distinct shade of blue, or looking very organic. A slight smile tugged on her lips. What ever was happening, part of her real life was coming through.

"So a few of the guys'll be heading to the pub to watch the game tonight." Mickey said between mouthfuls of egg. At least he had manners now. "D'ya mind?"

"Go for it," Rose said, a touch too quickly perhaps. "Just be studying tonight anyway." She added on, glancing down at her hands. "My ring!" She said without thinking, right taking left and looking at her naked ring finger.

"S-s-sorry?" Mickey stuttered, the color leaving his face.

"Nothing, sorry." Rose said with a shake of her head, standing up from the table. "Must be remembering a dream or something."

He nodded as he stood as well, looking at the plates on the table before glancing at her with a smile. A familiar one in both her memory of her past and what was also her present. "I'll see you when I get in." He said as he came around to kiss her goodbye.

Rose stuffed a piece of toast in her mouth before he could. "Later," She said around it before dashing out the flat.

She still lived in London, but not on the estates. Part of her memory told her that she and Mickey found their flat when he got a job at a different garage, and one of the guys there told him about it. They scrimped, and scrapped, and it meant Rose working a second job for the first little bit but they did it. And as she rode the bus and only the bus to her office job she was at least thankful for that.

As the morning went on, she slowly slipped into the life her mind was currently telling her was real. She greeted the people at the security desk by name and with a smile heading into the lift and heading up to the third floor. She headed right for her cubicle, giving a smile and a wave to those who passed by. She plopped down and went to work, getting lost in the menial tasks before her.

Contentment came over her as she started thinking more mundane things. Where was she going to pick up a quick bite, since Mickey was going to be out? How much school work could she get done tonight with East Enders being on, and should she wait up for Mickey? It was a simple life, but satisfying enough. She was getting ahead, she had savings, she was no longer in debt thanks to Jimmy bloody Stone. But there was something missing, something she couldn't place, but that was okay. Because what ever it was, it wasn't something Rose Tyler needed.

Rose Tyler didn't need anything more than a decent job, a decent flat away from the estates, and a decent enough bloke who tried his best and didn't beat her.

How sad that she wanted so little for herself.

"Rose," A girl, Suzanne she remembered, leaned around her cubicle. "Mind taking these invoices to the desk with yours?"

"Sure," She said, taking the papers while gathering a few of hers and headed to the desk at the other end of the room. "Hey, Lucie, here's some of mine and Suzanne's papers." She addressed the woman standing and heading away.

"Can ya hand them to the temp?" She asked before walking away, gesturing to a woman seated a few feet away.

Rose shifted but stopped, staring at Donna who gapped back at her.

And then she remembered.

Sort of.

Blurred images of space ships and machines, of voices fading as drugs took over. Nothing solid, but she knew that what ever happened, something went wrong.

"Hello," Donna said with a thin smile. "I'm Donna Noble."

"Rose Tyler," She replied extending her hand to Donna. She wasn't surprised but blissfully relieved when Donna squeezed her hand at the same moment she squeezed hers. "I've seen you before," Rose added. "I think we have the same Doctor."

"Yeah," Donna said with a slow nod. "I think we do, too."

* * *

 

It felt so normal. Get up, listen to her mother harp about her grown daughter still living home. Her grandfather would remind her that Donna sacrificed a great job and a flat in Glasgow to help her out after Geoffery passed. There was the typical argument over who would get the car even though her mother didn't really need it, and then the drive from Chiswick to London with up-beat Christmas music blaring to try and put her in a better mood.

First day at a new job, temp secretary at HC Clements, sales division. She'd long stopped being nervous about such things, but there was something about this particular temp job, at this time of year, that made her weary. She didn't recall feeling that way until she woke up that morning. She remembered being thrilled and beyond excited to start something so posh the night before. But now, well, she wasn't too keen on going, and something deep inside her told her not to drink the coffee.

"It's a chilly morning on this lovely, sunny day. One week til Christmas, and it doesn't look like we should be expecting a white one." The radio announcer said after White Christmas had just finished playing. "And with the kind of luck we've been having the last couple years around London, people are starting to wonder if they should leave town."

"That's right, James. The last two years have provided us with alien invasions during what's supposed to be a peaceful time."

"And both times our Prime Minister, Harriet Jones, has gotten us through it all, but one must wonder what it is about our lovely city that makes those from other planets want to visit."

"Has to be for the pudding."

She didn't understand why, but Donna felt as though she shouldn't have remembered this. She almost felt like a big part of her brain should have turned a blind eye to the events they were talking about. But she remembered with clarity her mother and Grandfather going up to the roof of their hotel until somehow they managed to snap out of it. She remembered seeing the star-shaped web above the city. Alright, so maybe the second event was something she felt she should remember. Like maybe she was there with two people she cared about dearly.

But it didn't matter, none of it did. A week before Christmas. Blimey, she needed to get some shopping done.

But that would come later.

She parked her car in the underground garage, collected her badge at reception when she entered the building, giving a curious glance at the funny little elf thing sitting on the counter before she headed to the lift and up to the third floor.

"You must be Donna," A kind, sweet woman with blonde hair and blue eyes greeted as she came off the lift. "Right, so, you'll be here with me at the desk." She rambled, continuing on about the obvious tasks that she'd be expected to do as a secretary.

Donna half ignored her, having read the job description and not being a total dunce. She looked over the people in the office, the faces of strangers whose names she'd likely learn but would hardly remember in six months when the gig was up. Hardly ever did she really make friends in a place like this, though it would be nice to meet a bloke.

No. Wait, no, no blokes from here. And no matter what, a voice in her head told her, do not drink the bloody coffee. Not unless she was the one who brewed it or prepared it.

Donna went right to work, throwing herself into it without really giving it much thought until she heard, "Hey, Lucie, here's some of mine and Suzanne's papers."

Donna's eyes shot up from the papers in her hand, taking in the new blonde in front of her.

Rose.

Now she knew why she wasn't so sure about this place, why she didn't want to trust a man or the coffee. She remembered being saved by the Doctor, with Rose, of turning them down than not stopping until she found them again. She remembered traveling, the people she met, the things she'd seen. Different memories ran along side the ones she thought was real. She shouldn't be here, she should be traveling, seeing wondrous new things.

"Hello, I'm Donna Noble." She said, hoping for more than a stare for a reaction. Hoping that this woman who she knew so well in another life still remembered her.

"Rose Tyler," She said offering her hand, squeezing it in time with Donna. "I've seen you before. I think we have the same Doctor." She said, putting emphasis on the word.

"Yeah," Donna nodded relief slowing her pounding heart. "I think we do."

Rose handed the papers she had over to Donna. "So, hey, if you're new around here maybe we can grab a bite after work? There's a pub around the corner."

"I'd like that." Donna replied as she set the papers aside.

"Oh look at you, making fast friends as always." Lucie said bitterly to Rose. "Get back to your cubicle."

Rose rolled her eyes, taking one last glance at Donna before she turned and headed back to work.

As Rose disappeared from sight, it was like a part of her wanted to forget everything she recalled from the life she wasn't currently living. To only know that she had an average life, and never needed or wanted much more than what she had. And maybe a good husband.

She'd almost forgotten about Rose entirely until the end of the day when the blonde was passing by the desk. She stopped short as she walked, as if maybe she'd nearly forgotten until she'd seen Donna as well. Rose waited, and Donna collected her stuff.

"How far away is this pub?" Donna asked as she threw her jacket on.

"Literally around the corner." Rose said. "It seems to me that in this life I've gone there often."

"This life," Donna repeated as she joined the blonde and headed out the building.

They were silent as they walked, but it was comfortable. They stood close as people passed by them, chatting about their holiday plans or what their office party would entail. It was like keeping near one another was helping to ground them in the reality that this wasn't supposed to be happening. They entered the dimly lit, relatively quiet establishment that was decked out in holiday decor, ordered a pint each, and waited until their server had taken their food orders and left before speaking.

"I don't understand what's going on here." Donna said as she clutched her stein tightly. "It's like … like I have two lives in my head. Until I saw you this morning it's like I didn't even realize it. It was as if this had always been. Like I never met you and the Doctor I mean." She looked into the gold colored drink. "Where is he?"

"I don't know," Rose admitted. "I live with my ex, Mickey. Here I … I met him, the Doctor, but I didn't go with him. Didn't even see his face. But even that memory feels very distorted somehow. Like I'm remembering it wrong."

"What happened, why are we living like this?" Donna asked. She tried to remember, but all she recalled was being on a space ship, staring at Rose's back, then falling as the the world turned black.

"I don't know." Rose said again.

"Well what do you know, then?" Donna snapped. Rose looked at her imploringly, and Donna felt guilty. "Sorry." She said quietly. "It's just that you're so experienced. You know things that I don't."

"Not a lot." Rose laughed without mirth. "It was the Doctor that knew things, not me."

"What about that big ol' brain of yours, with all that quick thinking?"

"Not here." Rose shook her head. "Because if I never traveled with the Doctor than I wouldn't have taken on the heart of the TARDIS, so I wouldn't have become …." She stopped, looking down at her drink. She lifted her stein, picked up the coaster, looking at it with disbelief. "Bad Wolf." She said, showing the coaster to Donna.

Bad Wolf lager.

"A sign to lead myself here." Rose partially mumbled.

"You did this?" Donna asked, annoyance bubbling up a bit more than it should.

"Do you really think I would lead myself, us, to a life in which I wasn't with him? Used that power to tie myself to him, I wouldn't've separated us."

"So why is that there?" Donna gestured to the coaster.

"A warning." Rose said firmly. "Something to trigger the memory I suppose. In case I forgot."

Donna looked at it as Rose placed it back on the bar top. The blonde set her stein down on it just as the server came back around with a platter of chips.

"I'm not a mother in this world." Rose said matter-of-factly with a slight tremor. "Jenny wouldn't exist. Or maybe she does, she's just not mine."

"Right." Donna said, unable to find the words to address something so significant. She didn't really consider that an entire life wouldn't come to be in their current scenario.

"There's another problem we haven't really addressed." Rose said after munching a salt and vinegar soaked chip.

"What?" Donna asked as she tried to find one not so heavily loaded.

"Where's Tim?" Rose asked, and Donna suddenly remembered the sarcastic little twig she'd grown fond of.

"We're living another life. Which means …." Her shoulder's drooped as her heart sank. "He's all alone, ain't he?"

"Across the pond." Rose nodded. "And I've no way to get a hold of him."

"Well, what about Facebook? He's gotta have a Facebook."

"Tried on my lunch break. Two that could be him, closed off accounts and cartoons for pictures, but he wasn't an overly social teenager." Rose paused after plucking up another fry. "Come to think of it, he's not a teenager at this moment, is he? I noticed the date a few times throughout the day: December 17th, 2008. He's twenty right now, same as what we knew him."

"So same age as he was with us? Wait, if you never traveled on the TARDIS, then that means you're younger."

Rose nodded. "Only twenty-two now. 'S why I thought he was a teenager."

"Well, bright side is you're farther away from thirty now." Donna reasoned.

"Except in another life I'm practically immortal." Rose reminded her. "I got a paper cut today and for a few seconds I couldn't understand why it didn't instantly heal."

"Well, watch out for busses then." Donna shrugged, smirking at Rose's snort before chuckling lightly. "What are we going to do?" She asked, much more somber now that moment passed. "Something's wrong, and we need to fix it. Not that this world isn't sorta great, but when you know the better life you were leading."

"It is everything I dreamed of before I met the Doctor." Rose confirmed, eyes on the chips. "I made my life better. 'S like," She worried her bottom lip with her teeth, meeting Donna's gaze. "I almost died the night we met, and right up until he got me outside everything's the same. Memory's fuzzy, but he pushed me out the back door and I just ran. Realized I had a second chance at life. Took it."

"Suppose we don't do anything, then?" Donna asked, only a tiny bit serious. "Suppose we let things continue?"

The pain in Rose's eyes made her wish she'd never said the words. Heart ache danced in those hazel eyes, and she could see Rose swallowing around what was likely a lump in her throat.

"Thought you loved him?" Rose asked softly.

"I do, you know I do. He's like family. But, I was just thinking out loud, is all. We're living lives we wanted before we met him, so maybe it's not so bad." Donna sighed, reaching across the table and clutching Rose's hand. "But it was better with him."

Rose nodded, brushing her hair back behind her ear. "Not to mention that we know this isn't right." Rose said with only a slight hitch to her voice. "No matter how much it seems like it is during the day I just keep getting this nagging feeling of wrong."

"Yeah," Donna said, though it admittedly wasn't a nagging feeling so much an odd twinge. "So, what should we do?"

"First thing's first, I'm going to track down Tim." Rose said firmly. "And once I get him back to us, we're going to try and figure out how we can find the Doctor."

"How are you going to get Psych boy back to us?" Donna asked.

Rose smiled weakly. "How ever I can."

* * *

 

After Donna dropped her off at her building, Rose went straight for the computer. What she hadn't told Donna was she had sent a very simple private message to the two Tim Latimer's that blocked off their profiles: Wolf Girl. She'd been hoping desperately that one of them replied with some kind of confirmation that it was her Tim. It was, after all, only 7am his time when she sent it.

There was nothing.

She wracked her brain, hoping to remember the name of his aunt in an effort to locate him.

But she couldn't.

She Googled him, remembering seeing the letter 'J' as part of his author name in the future.

It turned up, of all things, a Canadian white pages listing with a phone number. Maybe it was him, maybe it wasn't, but with her heart pounding in her chest she fumbled her mobile until she was able to correctly punch in the number without mistakes. Rose recalled right after hitting the call button that this phone did not have universal roaming, and this call was going to be expensive.

It rang twice, then stopped.

Pulling the phone away from her ear, she noticed the call was disconnected. She hit redial.

It rang twice, then disconnected.

Huffing, she aggressively hit the redial button.

It rang once.

"Look, I don't know what the fuck you're trying to sell me, but…." Tim's voice hit her like a bullet, except instead of pain blossoming over her chest it was relief.

"Tim." She said his name, hearing the crack in her voice at the joy that she'd found him.

Silence on the other end lingered long enough that she thought maybe he'd disconnected the call again.

"Wolf Girl?" His cracked voice came over the line, and Rose almost burst into tears at hearing them in Tim's voice. "Fuck, don't … don't do that. If you're Wolf Girl, say something."

She laughed. "I wish I knew what there was to say." She replied honestly, and he laughed with relief on the other end. "Where are you?"

"Where the hell do you think? Fucking Canada in the middle of fucking winter freezing my ass off, wondering how the hell I got back here."

"You remember everything then?" She asked.

"Remember? Umm, yeah, that's an understatement." He grumbled. "I assume you're in England somewhere. Or are you actually with Storm Boy and you two just randomly ditched me to be held against my will on a space ship?"

"You know what happened to us?" She asked more desperately, bolting up from the chair and having it roll half way across the flat.

"Yeah, I do. But maybe we can video chat or something later because this call is going to cost you a fortune."

"Yeah, right." Rose said, shaking her head as she tried to remember that this was a life without the Doctor and his tech enhancements. "Umm, you have a passport, yeah?"

"Umm. Yeah, somewhere." He replied, then added more hesitantly, "Why?"

"How do you feel about spending Christmas in London?" She asked him, her heart speeding up again.

"That would be awesome, I'll be there as soon as I can." He replied. "This your mobile? I can text you."

"Yeah," Rose confirmed.

"'Kay. I'll let you know when I get my flight booked."

Rose snorted. "You have the money for a last minute just laying around?"

"Apparently I have the money for a last minute private jet laying around. Still think I'll take commercial though." He mused, chuckling to himself. "Later, Wolf Girl." He said just before they hung up.

Donna and Tim, two of her best mates in the real universe had been located, and she had confirmation that they both remembered things as they should. Now, there was only one person left to find.

And she had no idea how to get a hold of him.

Flopping down on the futon, she rubbed the bridge of her nose in effort to clear an on coming headache. Her mind wandered to the thought of homework, of East Enders, of trying to return to the life she was supposed to be living, but she refused to do any of it. What was the point? With any luck, she'd be able to set this all right. She'd be back home where she belonged. What ever she was meant to achieve in this life wasn't real, didn't matter.

Her phone rang, and she lazily hit the accept button and put it to her ear. "Hello?"

"Oh good, you're alive." Jackie's voice trilled in her ear, and Rose sat up straighter. "Here I thought you were gonna be coming over for East Enders tonight."

"Mum," She gasped out.

"What is it, Sweetheart, what's wrong?" Her Mum asked, all pretense of being angry gone at Rose's simple emotion filled word.

She'd forgotten. If she'd never met the Doctor, than it was highly unlikely that her mother would have ended up in the parallel universe. She was here. In this world, her Mum was still a phone call or bus ride away. She was still there.

"Nothing," Rose said, shaking her head. "Just missed you, 's all."

"Missed me? Doubt that, missy, else ya'd have been here for tea, like you said you would. And Howard was keeping clear so we could have time to ourselves, but no."

"Sorry," She said. "Just got busy."

"With that job," Her mother scoffed at the word.

"At least I'm doin' something with my life." Rose said with a smile, enjoying the banter with her mother that she sorely missed over the six years she hadn't had it.

"Yeah." Her mother relented. "Just remember that you said you and Mickey'd do a proper sit down with Howard and me on Sunday. Expect to see you both here, too."

"Of course." Rose replied, then as an after thought. "Might have a friend coming to stay with me by then, mind if he comes?"

"What friend is this, then?" Jackie asked suspiciously.

"Just a friend." Rose brushed it off.

She could sense her mother's want to ask more questions, and a part of her wanted her to.

"Suppose it won't be a problem," Jackie finally replied. "Just let me know by Saturday."

"'Course." Rose relented.

"Alright, well, g'night, Sweetheart. Don't work yourself too hard." They said their goodbyes, and Rose was left sitting on the futon, staring at her phone.

Her Mum was here in this life. She was living well with Mickey, a decent job, a better life than she should have had.

She forgot, for only a second, that she was missing the most important person in the Universe.

Getting up, she went to their tiny kitchen, found a bottle of whiskey, and poured herself a hearty glass. She took a good sized gulp of it while leaning against the counter, feeling the burn in her throat and the way it warmed her from the inside. Flicking on the stereo, she groaned when an Elvis Christmas album started playing.

She recalled that in this life, she and Mickey had listened to it together as they decorated their tiny fake tree before having some hot chocolate and then ….

Rose didn't want to remember what they did next, so she took another burning gulp and changed the song.

She laughed when it changed to the one, singular song she refused to play that day.

Blue Christmas.

Oh how funny that was, for what did she associate that color with most? What was this song about at its core? And there it was, more evidence that something was trying to keep her from remembering how things were supposed to be. Rose put the song on continuous play, drinking whiskey and enjoying the ache the words of the song brought her. Eventually it got harder to stand, so she moved to the futon after topping up her drink. The buzz that hummed in her head made the memories of the few Christmas she shared with the Doctor come through stronger, and soon she was belting the song in impressively accurate key along with the man they once tried to see.

It was through her fifth performance along with the King that the flat door opened, and Mickey walked through the door looking thoroughly confused. He glanced at the stereo, to Rose, to the drink her hand, to the stereo again, all like he was hearing a different language.

"Babe?" He asked.

"He had blue eyes once, you remember?" She asked. "Then they turned brown, and he saved us all, then we ate turkey and broke crackers and watched ash fall. But you don't remember that part 'cause you're not real." She said. "Well, you're real, suppose, but this ain't. Not this life."

Mickey smiled warmly, like she was the most adorable thing in the world. She remembered he used to look at her like that so long ago, the last time being when the Cybermen and the Daleks attacked and he came back through the void for a little bit. "I was so happy to see you that day," She said without thinking. "Like, properly happy. I should have said a proper goodbye to you, too. You were standing right there, just behind Mum on that beach an' I ignored you. Rude of me that was. Rude and not ginger."

"Rose, you're pissed." He said sweetly.

"Pretty good mood right now, actually." She said, looking at the traces of whiskey in her glass. "Oh," She smiled, laughing a little. "Right. Pissed. But 's like the only way I can remember him perfectly. Shuts up the lie for a bit. Miss him. Him and his blue eyes. Think he still has those blue eyes if I wasn't there to kill him?"

"Rose, what are you on about?" Mickey asked, taking the glass from her hand and setting it on the counter.

"Dunno, too pissed. Had some drinks with Donna before coming home, then I drank while I sang with Elvis. Hard bloke to track down, honestly."

"Who's Donna?" He asked, brow knitted as he guided her down the hall and into their bedroom.

"Friend. Good friend. Great friend. His best mate aside from me." She replied as Mickey started to undress her. "Oi! Hands off." She said, slapping his fingers hard enough for him to wince.

"Alright," He said, shaking his hand as if that would rid it of the pain. "Just trying to help."

"I know, sorry." She replied. They stood there silently for an awkward amount of time, Mickey putting his hands in his pockets. "Whattya doing?"

"Making sure you don't need help." Mickey replied.

"I'll be fine," She insisted, a part of her brain understanding that that would have been normal. He didn't argue, though, and he left their bedroom as asked.

Rose changed, found a pair of big, heavy flannel jimjams that was a clear statement of 'not in the mood', though she was certain her earlier lie of feminine issues was also working to keep Mickey at bay. Once changed and cleaned up, Rose crawled under the blankets. It made her weary, knowing that falling asleep would leave her vulnerable to Mickey and his affections. But she also knew she couldn't fight it off, especially with the alcohol in her veins making her dozy.

It didn't occur to her until her lids slipped shut that the whiskey helped her do more than recall her proper life. It helped her drift off to sleep without the cool presence of her Time Lord beside her. Her heart ached, her arms felt empty, the bed too warm, but she was too tired not to succumb.

* * *

 

He truly felt like he went insane.

When Tim woke up on October 18th, he rolled out of bed, collapsed on the floor, and curled into a ball. He clutched his head and cried for hours, trying to cope with having not two, but three different sets of memories circling in his head. There were the two he was used to having, the year that never was followed by the year he lived out once it was reset. But now there was a third set, one in which he'd never met the Doctor or Wolf Girl.

Not that the new reality was a bad thing. The floor he collapsed on was hardwood, but the nice kind. The sheets that tempted to cling to his waist had been a lot softer than the ones he had on his bed at his aunt's, or even he ones he had had in his own apartment. He of course knew what it meant, why they were there. In this reality he was rich. Well, Aunt Lorainne was rich, and he was her ward which meant he gained financial value. They didn't stay in the city where he was tormented after she hit the jackpot, leaving just before things got so bad that he had wanted to start taking measures in ending his presence on Earth. In this reality, he had his hair cut neatly because he didn't feel he needed that extra bit of rebellion. He was still a rail, but he felt like he was a lot stronger in his reality than he had been in the previous ones, even during the year that never was.

But that was the thing, in his mind he went to bed on the seventeenth Tim Latimier: Rich kid with a poor kids attitude on life. Volunteer Big Brother to kids in need of a friend when he knew too well what it was like to not have one. He had no direction in life, and it really didn't matter. He had a decent size bank account, a flashy car to get him to University, and there was a girl in his bed who he was pretty sure was called Brittany, but could have been Bethany.

He woke up knowing his entire life was a lie, that he wasn't this person, and he never wanted to be. He woke up as if from a nightmare, only he remembered every single detail of how he got to where he was...

* * *

_In a possible other life ..._

 

 

"Where are we?" Tim asked as he stepped out of the TARDIS into a corridor. There were porthole windows that revealed them to be in space, so it was safe to assume they were on a space station or ship of some kind, but he liked knowing the particulars.

"Not sure," The Doctor said, hands in his brown, pin stripped pant pockets. No over coat, geek glasses on. All business.

"Comforting." Donna said, and Tim could hear the eye roll in the woman's voice before he even looked to see the teasing smirk on her face.

Wolf girl had wandered to look around, scooping out the area.

"Something feels off," She said, looking to the Doctor who gave an all too serious glance in her direction.

"Yeah," he said, dragging out the word, looking around.

He lead them down the corridor, opening a door with a push of a button and looking around at the interior. The rest followed, the door closing behind Tim as he was the last one in.

The room had some sort of computer in the corner which Wolf Girl immediately went for. There were these things that sort of reminded Tim of hospital beds, half a dozen of them, but there wasn't any other equipment in the room.

"Why does this place feel, I dunno, dangerous?" Donna asked, shifting her arms from crossed to holding herself as she looked around them as if she wasn't sure she wanted to.

"Because there's something in the air." The Doctor said, low and dangerous. "Something that could be quite bad."

"Yeah, cause the cryptic way you tell us what's seriously wrong here makes me feel so much better," Tim had said back, rolling his head and meeting Storm Boy's stormy eyes. "When you say something bad in the air are we talking toxic gases? Air born viruses? Second hand smoke?"

"Nothing that harmful. Tell me, any of you starting to feel, I don't know, like you could use a quick kip?" He asked, bouncing on his heels.

Tim looked over to Donna in time to see her yawn. "Yeah, suppose so."

"Don't." The Doctor said, taking out his sonic and sticking up straight in the air.

"Think we're at some sorta station." Rose said, and Tim noticed her chewing her lip between. "Only this room, a few others. There's a docking station, but doesn't look like a ship's been here for a bit."

"Any signs of life?" The Doctor asked, and Rose started typing.

She stiffened. "Yeah," She said, barely heard as Tim yawned suddenly in spite of himself. "Another six."

Tim looked back to the Doctor, the grim line of his mouth and his narrowed brow not exactly comforting the anxiousness that was fighting through the sudden need to sleep. The Doctor was focused on his sonic, and what ever he was seeing likely wasn't good.

"You know what I hate about the fifty-first century? Apart from time agents mucking about, and the overwhelming amount of enhancements humans make to themselves? It's the fact that you lot had the brilliant idea to develop an agent that would be pumped in to hotel suites to ease the guests into a quiet slumber. Other wise, those who had those bloody enhancements would keep most the floor awake. So dormientes gas is added to the venting system, those who want it will allow it to vent will keep them open, those who don't close it. It acts slowly," He said as Donna yawned again, and Tim really couldn't help but yawn with her. "Lulls you, lowers you defenses, eases you into that slumber you so crave." Rose yawned. "And you know what the worst part it? We'll be out before we make it to the TARDIS."

The door nearest Rose opened, and she backed toward them with her arms out to the side as five men and one woman wearing a gas mask moved toward them. The men held guns that looked like it would shoot lasers of some kind, and they were all dressed in something that made Tim think military.

"Two of them are almost out," The woman said with a confident, smug tone as she placed a hand on her hip.

Tim made the mistake of turning his head to see what she meant, feeling the wave of sleep making him dizzy enough to collapse on his knees.

"Doctor," Donna attempted to say, but it was sounding more slurred than anything. Straining to keep his eyes opened, Tim managed to see her eyes roll back as she fell forward, the Doctor lunging to catch her. He blinked hard, shaking his head before he looked up at the woman.

"Why are you doing this?" The Doctor asked the woman, but as Tim's eyes grew too heavy to keep open it was hard to focus.

"Why does anyone do anything to you, Doctor? Because you wronged them. Well, more accurately, your people." The woman replied.

"What?" He heard Wolf Girl's voice start to fade, but Tim wasn't able to stay conscious enough to hear the rest of the conversation.

* * *

 

Drugged, all of them, even the superior Time Lord. Someone who wanted revenge on him. For what though? And what kind of revenge was it to put him to sleep with his companions and make them live out a life that wasn't real?

It slowly occurred to him that he wasn't the only one who was reset, and that it was highly likely that Rose and Donna were back across the pond. And, he was suddenly sure, without the Doctor.

He no longer had a way to get in touch with them, and as his mind caught up with him he realized his life was altered so much there was nothing but his name as means to be found by any of them.

When he was finally able to peel himself off the floor he used that very thing as his homing beacon. He wanted his phone number made public, and he didn't care how many calls he had to hang up on if it meant Wolf Girl and Time Lady would track him down. He set up a Facebook page, something this life told him he shouldn't have because he was a tad too wealthy to be followed so easily. He blocked it off to anything but his name and, he hoped, a helpful hint it was him by a cartoon drawing of a wolf with an hourglass on its head. He sat back, and prayed. Because whenever he tried to find them there were either too many Rose Tylers that came back as a return, or Donna Noble couldn't be looked up and found. In any shape way or form for both cases.

Days passed.

He became withdrawn from the life he was supposed to have been living, continuing with classes because it made the days go by, and tending to his volunteer requirements because there were kids who needed him, but he didn't bother with much else. There wasn't any sense in forming new attachments, seeing as how was pretty sure there wasn't much point in holding on to the few he did. He was almost positive this was not a real state, that they weren't on a new time line, but he couldn't be sure.

This reality he was stuck in meant he never met the Time Lord, so his thought things were far less defined and nowhere near the strength they should have been. He couldn't tell what was coming, what should have been, what had happened to anyone else.

Which was probably the only reason he hadn't been able to use it to find any of them by the time December rolled around.

Days ticked by, and he was becoming more depressed. He started wondering if maybe this was some kind of nightmare, and all he'd have to do to wake up was to …. Well, he did have a fairly good acquaintance with steak knife before meeting the Doctor as John Smith, he could always attempt to renew that relationship if it meant getting himself back to the body and the life he was sure he was supposed to have. Yet at the same time it was like days went by in a blink, quick enough that he didn't have time to dwell on it unless he wanted to.

He'd get up every day, get ready, head to school, come home if there were no volunteer gigs, check for messages that never came, and have a beer or three while he starting to doubt what he thought he knew.

A particularly frigid day two months after he woke up in the reality he was leaving school and heading for the bus, his license suspended for drinking and driving, when his phone rang. He didn't recognize the number, and the name was private, so he ignored it. Moments later, his phone rang again with the same number. Tim had already gotten his hopes up enough over these things for the last two months that he wasn't about to this time. Not when it was so fucking cold he thought his nuts would fall off, and the bus was ten minutes late as it was.

When it rang for a third time he answered to give the poor sales person a good shouting when he heard his name spoke from the lips of an angel and he nearly collapsed in the snow.

Wolf Girl had finally found him.

* * *

 

It had been four, quick seeming days days of avoiding Mickey like the plague and coming up with ridiculous reasons not to kiss him. So much so that it was one of the things her mother noticed when they went to her house the day before. However, in a move very unlike her mother, she never once vocalized it. Maybe it was because Howard was there, maybe it was because every single glare or worried glance her mother shot her was countered with a reassuring smile, or maybe it was the fact that Rose was glued to her mother's side whenever possible. Regardless, she walked away with her mother probably just thinking they had gotten into a tiff and she was just fine with that.

Mickey, however, was not so accepting of the sudden distance Rose put between them. Which is likely what prompted him into coming home from work earlier than expected the Monday Tim was set to arrive.

It was the earliest he could get to her that close to the holidays, and he was on standby since the day of their reconnection. His flight would just be landing, and he insisted that she didn't need to pick him up at the airport, feeling perfectly capable of flagging down a cab and getting to her place without issue. She she waited with nervous anticipation, and a glass of wine. Her only company was that stupid elf decoration that seemed to have relocated itself in a different part of the flat each morning, and this time it was perched on the computer desk staring right at her. She very vaguely recalled her mother telling her it was the latest "tradition", and they should get in the habit of having it out for when they have kids.

Rose took a huge gulp at the thought, both dreading the idea and instantly heart heavy at the thought of not having her daughter in this reality.

"Hey Babe," Mickey said as he came in, startling Rose and causing her to whip around and gap at him. He looked at the wine glass in her hand with a smirk as he shed his winter gear. "What's up?" He asked as if it had been routine.

"Not much," She said as she lifted her glass to her lips. "We'll be having someone staying with us for a few days. Or weeks." She added quickly before gulping back half her wine. She really hoped it wouldn't take the three of them that long to be back on the TARDIS.

Mickey headed into the kitchen. "That right?" he called, and she could hear him putting in some effort at not being a slob by getting down a plate. He must have been going for the pizza he had left in the fridge. He came into the living room, sitting next to Rose on the futon. She shifted as much away from him as she could, which wasn't very much as the arm was on her other side. "Who we have staying with us?" Mickey asked, scowling over his slice of pizza before there was a knock on the door. "Funny, no one buzzed in."

He was making to stand up but Rose was already on her feet, having handed him her glass of wine before rushing to the door.

She made quick work of the locks, listening to Mickey's protests that she didn't even check the peep hole. It didn't slow her down, and when she threw open the door and saw a nearly posh looking Tim smiling back at her on the other side, she couldn't help but return it.

"Fuck it's good to see you," He said, dropping his designer carry-on bag on the floor and throwing his arms around Rose in a vice-grip embrace. She returned it with as much strength as she could, relieved to have him back with her.

"You act like it's been more than a few days." She said into his neck where her head was stuffed.

He stepped back, looking at her with confusion. "It's been two months, Wolf Girl." Her heart dropped into the pit of her stomach, and she looked over him much more carefully. "You mean you've only been aware for a couple days?" He asked. "You haven't been leaving me hanging all this time?"

"Never." She said, gripping his arms tightly. "I'd never do that to you."

"Oi, who's this?" Mickey's voice came from behind, and Rose looked over her shoulder to see the man who thought he was her boyfriend looking at Tim with a scowl. His chest was puffed up, and he folded his arms in a way that tried to look intimidating.

"Oh, it's the Tin Dog." Tim said with a smile, slapping Mickey on the arm in a friendly gesture. "Mickey the Idiot."

"Excuse me, this is my home." Mickey said, looking Tim up and down in a way that sized him up.

"Right, yeah, sorry. You'd have no idea what I'm talking about, would you?" Tim said, grimacing before turning to Rose. "Sorry."

"And exactly who are you, Yank?" Mickey asked, jerking his head a little.

"Okay, not a Yank. Let's get that clear right now. Also, that's offensive, so I'd watch your manners. And holy shit that was probably the most stereotypically Canadian I have ever sounded in my life." He said the last bit to Rose who laughed, getting Tim to smile as he turned back to Mickey. "I'm Rose's half brother, Tim. Her Dad, rest his soul, played a little fast and loose with my Mom."

"My dad died when I was a baby," Rose whispered to him.

"I'm a lot older than I look. It happened before Rose's parents met." He added on the fly, stuffing his hands in his back pockets. "So there's that."

Mickey still looked suspicious, but he let it go, turning away and mumbling something about watching the game and returned to the futon.

Tim reached down behind him and grabbed his bag. "Donna knows, right?" He asked quietly as he set it down inside the flat.

"Yeah, We're going to go meet her a pub down the road." Rose said, glancing over her shoulder to see Mickey taking a significant bite of his slice.

"Because us sitting in public talking about living two lives is a good idea?" Tim asked with a smirk.

Rose pulled her jacket off the hook. "Because in this life I never met the Doctor, not that I can say for sure, and all Mickey knows about aliens is what happened on Christmas the last two years."

"Yeah, and the elf looks major creepy." Tim noted with a grimace.

"Yeah, that too." Rose said as she got on her scarf and hat. "Mick's," She got his attention instantly. "Gonna take Tim down to the pub and catch up."

"I'll come with you," Mickey said quickly. "Watch the match there."

"No, stay." She said quickly, which had Mickey tense and scowl. "Gonna go to Leroy's. He doesn't play the match when it's not United, yeah?" She reminded him, and Mickey reluctantly settled back down on the futon.

"Fine. Just call if ya need me." He said, but his attention was already back on the screen.

Rose nodded anyway before tilting her head toward the door and gesturing for Tim to head on out then grabbed her keys and followed.

Stepping outside in the brisk December air, Tim unzipped his jacket and pulled it off. He looked at Rose who gapped at him in only his sweater as she was practically hugging herself for warmth. "What? It's warm here." He said with a smirk and a shrug.

"Bloody insane, you are." Rose laughed, and he chuckled with her.

He stepped closer, dropping his arm around her. "Made for warmer weather than this." He said as they passed an alley, and Rose caught how he kept glancing at it as they walked by. They rounded a corner, heading down a little further until the Pub came into view.

As they walked into the nearly empty establishment, Rose spotted Donna immediately. She looked up as if snapping out of something, smiling wide at them and standing from the booth as Tim broke away from Rose to give Donna a firm hug.

"Good to see ya, Psychboy." She said with a grin he couldn't see.

"You too, M.I.W." He said as they stepped back just as Rose joined them. "But what do we do now? We're all together again except for the one person we know that might actually be able to figure out what the hell is going on. He has to know why we were drugged and stuffed into this shitty reality, right?"

Rose's heart stuttered, and she turned to Donna who looked just as surprised.

"When you said you knew what happened to us, you didn't just mean you remembered the last bit a little more clearly." Rose said, trying not let on how terrifying that idea was. She thought that maybe they would sit around, pool together their collective memories of those fleeting seconds, but to have the whole story ….

Tim licked his lips, fidgeting. "You don't?" He asked, looking between the two of them, and Rose and Donna shook their heads. "Well fuck."

Before much more could be said a server came by and asked for their drink orders. Once they all had a pint and were settled in the booth, Tim relayed what he remembered and what happened to him when he woke up. Rose clutched his hand from across the table, heart breaking for the spiral his mind went through without them, and the fact he was burdened with remembering it all.

"So they were after the Doctor, and we don't know why." Donna said, looking into her stein.

"Something to do with Time Lords is all I can piece together." Tim said before taking a sip of his drink. Something caught his attention and he frowned. "What is with the creepy elf things? They're everywhere. Saw them at the airport, in the cab ride over, in store fronts."

"New thing." Donna shrugged. "Don't get it myself. We don't even have one."

"We do." Rose snickered. "And Mickey seems to like it as he moves the bloody thing around the flat enough." She sighed. "'S Christmas." Rose said and Donna and Tim looked at her questioningly. "We remember that there was trouble here the last two years. And isn't that how you found us when you were looking, Donna? Searching for trouble?"

"Well, yeah, suppose." She said as thoughtfully before shaking her head. "But it's not like we know what's coming. The Adipose, things like that, they were conspiracy theories." She said as something brushed over Rose's leg. She looked to Tim, arching a brow, but he didn't look over. Didn't even seem to realize he bumped her. "When I knew what to look for it was easy," Donna continued. "But this? Yeah, something might happen. Only got two days to wait it out, but then what? We'd have to try and get right in the middle of it, and that's not gonna be easy."

"No." Rose said, trying to not to let the letdown crash over her.

The napkins, condiments, and shakers at the end of the table shook, drawing the attention of the three of them just as the salt shaker fell over.

"Someone's unlucky." Donna mused before her eyes went wide. "Oi, what was that?" She asked, looking over at Rose and then to Tim.

Rose turned to the man she thought was the culprit only see he was looking at something else.

"That elf is gone." He said point blank.

"Creepy elves." Rose said with resignation despite her heart rate picking up. "Just as bad as killer Christmas trees."

"Probably not quite that bad." A strange voice that warmed her insides pulled her attention back to the other side of the table. A man not much taller than her stood confidently more focused on the table than anything else. He was handsome, so, so handsome with intense blue eyes that focused intensely on whatever he thought was there. His hair brown was short, with a bit of a curl to it. He wore a leather jacket, blue jeans, black boots, and Rose wagered there'd be a jumper under that jacket, but it would likely be something much more luxurious than wool.

"Oi, who the hell do you think you are, mate?" Donna growled. "Listening in to private conversations."

His lips parted a slight bit before he tensed, reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a long, silver cylinder thing with a red nub that reminded Rose a bit of a medical tool. He pointed it at the table, a whirring sound filling the air before a tiny, high pitched scream followed.

Rose got to her feet, looking over Donna to see the body of the creepy little elf twitching on the floor by her feet.

She smiled, her heart rate picking up for another reason entirely as she suddenly understood, and turned back to the man before them.

The man smirked. "I'm the Doctor." He said, pocketing what had to be his sonic screwdriver inside his jacket. "Though probably not the one you were expecting."


	28. A Wonderful LIfe

"I found a picture in my basement. My face a hundred years ago. But I don't wanna do like he did, so full of pride and all alone"

The Doctor's head pounded as if he let Jack convince him to drink a couple dozen shots of hyper vodka. It only happened once before, in another life, after Rose had gone to bed. He swore the next morning that he shouldn't have allowed himself to have a human-ish experience like that again. Must have been Donna's doing this time.

He looked around, taking in his surroundings, finding himself in the library. Oh, it must have been bad if he was sent to sleep in here instead of the bed he shared with his warm, beautiful human. Rising from the sofa, he winced with the jolt of pain that darted through his head. First, medbay for some pain relief. Next, the bedroom to beg Rose's forgiveness. He stumbled down the corridor, reminding him a bit like adjusting to a new body after regenerating. He found the medbay with ease, popped an instant pain relief tablet and let it dissolve on his tongue as he searched for his bedroom.

The only door that he could find was the one to the room that had been his before Rose and he became a couple.

"Is she that mad at me, Old Girl?" He asked the ship with a pat on the wall.

He didn't need her hummed lament to tell him that something was really, truly wrong.

The Doctor hadn't heard that voice from within his head for two bodies. The hand, while manly, did not have the long, slender fingers he was used to. And the frock. He should be wearing brown pin strips, blue at most, not green velvet.

How in Rassilon's name did he end up back in his eighth body?

"Rose? Donna? Tim?" He yelled, bolting to the console room. "Rose!? Sweetheart, answer me!"

He arrived, and it was the Victorian sitting room he feared it would be.

"How?" He asked, moving to the arm chair and collapsing into it. "How did this?" He stopped, the memories coming back to him.

Dormientes in the air of the small little space station. A trap. A woman who had a grudge against Time Lords and managed to track down the last of them. Jenny had flashed in his mind before passing out from the gas, but he was sure she was safe.

The reality he was in began to come through in his memories as well.

He didn't burn Gallifrey, he led the charge to put the whole planet in a pocket Universe, saving it from the Daleks with twelve other Time Lords. Men and women like him who wanted an end to the war and didn't trust that, should they win, those in power wouldn't try to use their victory to gain power of the Universe. To be more than the great observers. He was the unlucky thirteen who survived the shock wave of Dalek fire power expanding around them as they destroyed themselves. His TARDIS, museum piece as she was, had stronger shields than the rest thanks to all the travels they'd gone through, and the work he'd done on her daily through the war.

He was still the last of the Time Lords, but only in this Universe.

And because he didn't destroy the planet, he didn't regenerate. He was older, more war worn than his youthful, enchanting appearance had been at the start of this life, but alive.

Alive, and without his Rose.

As a Time Lord, he was used to having more than one set of memories when time line's altered, but this was hell. Because everything about this was wrong. It felt wrong, and that was why he had the headache. Though, he thought with a chuckle, Jack has been known to give the same kind of headaches with his wrongness.

Before setting to do anything else, he scanned the time lines of this reality to see if there was a problem with finding Rose and the others. He was pleasantly surprised it wasn't going to cause the Universe to implode to do so.

But there was a tiny issue: he'd met her, but not really. He'd saved her from the explosion, but that was all the contact he'd had with her. She didn't know his name, likely didn't even see his face, and would have absolutely no clue he was in this body at this age. Maybe if he'd looked younger she'd have a slight recall of the image he'd shown her once.

But then there was the possibility she didn't remember him at all. He may be the only one in this reality out of their quartet that remembered their other, proper life.

It didn't matter. He was going to find her anyway, no matter what. He'd get his Rose back even if he had to collapse the reality to do it.

Getting up to start his search, he looked down at what he was wearing.

While a part of him approved, another part of him didn't. He was going to have to search for her in 21st century London, he'd need to change into something more appropriate for her time period like he had in his last (next?) two bodies. Especially if he wanted any hope of jogging her memory if she didn't really have it.

To the wardrobe, then.

It seemed as though next to nothing felt appropriate. His mind warred with itself, one part wanting that classic Victorian look, and so help him if he ran his hands over that brown, pin-stripped suit one more time he was going to cut it off. And wasn't that just a little too familiar. Another part wanted to be recognizable to the subconscious of his Rose, even if it meant not looking quite so slick as he was used to.

When he stumbled across a leather jacket from a life yet lived and yet long gone something simply felt right, which was a little something he could use among the wrong. Jeans, he would need denim, and neither voice protested too strongly to that, and both agreed that they should certainly be more fitted than the ones he wore/would wear in his ninth body.

A northern accent growled "oi" in the back of his mind.

He was short compared to what he would become, and it took him nearly forever in the wardrobe (twenty minutes and forty seven seconds) to find a pair that would fit his small frame adequately. Blue, ugh, how utterly casual. But when in a pinch, beggars couldn't be choosers, and he very well wasn't about to go shopping for anything. To off set it, a white cashmere sweater (honestly, when did he acquire that?) was quickly replacing the waist coat and shirt sleeves, and all the other Victorian garb that remained. Throwing the leather jacket on over his shoulders, adjusting it's loose fit he took himself in.

Not terrible, though he should probably find some foot wear. The boots he got from Grace would work (they really were quite comfortable), and with the completed look he returned to the console room.

Powell estates, London, Earth, two thousand eight, March sixth. Three years after the day they met in Rose's time line.

But why? Why not just go back for her those precious few seconds after he pushed her out the back door? Grab her hand in the alley and tell her to run once more, explain the time travel thing after?

He changed the date and place before he dematerialized the TARDIS, not noticing that the Old Girl changed both on him. They landed smoothly, and he glanced at the monitor.

"No, no, we're going back for her." He told his ship. "We are not letting a single second of her precious life go by without us after we've met." His ship hummed in disagreement. "Why are you being so temperamental? I already checked, time lines won't become distorted if we go back for her." The TARDIS simply nudged his mind, asking him to go outside. "Alright, if you insist." He relented, not really feeling like arguing with his sentient time ship when reality was so severely distorted.

He stepped outside, looking at the pub across the street. It only took a second for him to realize what he was looking at: Rose and their companions sitting in a booth by the window, chatting.

His hearts leapt and a smile spread over his face before he chuckled to himself.

The Doctor headed toward them, watching them intently, pausing when he noticed a Christmas decoration standing up and hopping off the ledge it had been sitting on.

Well that wasn't right, was it? Alarms started going off in his mind, and he lost the smile as he marched into the pub. He caught sight of thing moving across the floor toward the trio he had come to find.

He marched toward them, hearing Tim say, "The elf is gone." Before he turned his attention to what Donna and Rose had been looking at.

"Creepy elves," Rose said, sounding all the Universe like she wasn't at all surprised by that. "Just as bad as killer Christmas trees."

The remark nearly caught the Doctor up short, but the tiny cackle reminded him that there was something needing stopping.

"Probably not quite that bad." The Doctor commented, watching for the thing, seeing if it would attack or merely try to escape out the window.

"Oi," Donna momentarily distracted him. "Who the hell do you think you are, mate? Listening in to private conversations."

He was prepared to reply when he noted the small hand clutching the table, the eyes of the elf no longer looking mischievous as it's head came over the side of the table. They were dark red, its smile wicked, and it didn't take him long to pull his screwdriver out and setting it to a pulse that likely wouldn't affect the humans in front of him.

The elf dropped, it's high pitched scream stopping just after it landed on the floor.

Rose got up, peeking over Donna before turning back toward him with a grin that made his hearts speed with joy and soar with relief.

"I'm the Doctor," he finally answered Donna's question. "Though probably not the one you were expecting.

* * *

 

"Dude, what?" Tim said with a laugh. "Fuck, man, you … what?"

"Oh, come on, Tim. You know I regenerate." The Doctor replied, but his attention was drawn to Rose as she moved toward him. She hesitated to touch him but eventually did, her fingers lightly caressing the edges of his cheeks, feeling the stubble that ran along his jaw line. There was no link, no bond, not even a hint. His skin was cool, though not as reassuring as she'd like. It was cold outside, after all.

Her heart sank, but she caught his eye. His ancient eyes that pleaded with her as her doubt must have been there in her eyes peering back.

Why was she doubting this was her Doctor? He knew about the trees, he spoke of regeneration.

"Rose," He said her name softly, begging her to see him. His hand took her free one, lacing their fingers together. "I said a word, just one word."

"Run," Rose said.

"And we have never stopped running." He stroked his thumb along her naked ring finger. "There should be something there."

"I know." She agreed, her heart aching as her mind started reconciling that this was him. Regenerated. What happened to him?

"Okay, I can sorta see the struggle Wolf Girl's going through, so tell me something only the Doctor would know." The Doctor turned his gaze away from her, likely to Tim considering the incredulous look he had. "She doesn't recognize you, and I don't remember you from the bodies I have seen, so tell me something only the Doctor would know."

He considered. "You told me you loved Rose in the dungeon on Namtier, and you knew I was going to kill you for a split second before you explained yourself. And even then there was a part of me that wanted to hurt you."

"Yep, good enough for me." Tim said. Rose had whipped her head around at the mention of the 'L' word, catching Tim's face turning red before he hid behind his pint glass. She smirked, knowing exactly how he would have meant it but still finding his embarrassment adorable.

"Hold on," Donna said, clamoring out of the booth and standing beside Rose. "Oh, blimey you're short now." She said, looking over the Doctor as he looked back, offended. "But … why are you different? Why have you changed bodies?"

"Because in this reality I didn't die in the Time War." He said, looking to Rose. "Gallifrey wasn't destroyed, but hidden. We still met, but you met me in this body. And since you didn't travel with me, I never had a reason to regenerate. This is my eighth body, though not nearly as elegant looking as what the TARDIS showed you."

"Eighth?" Rose said, and he nodded slightly. She frowned. "But you remember me, yeah? Properly?" Rose asked, chewing her bottom lip.

He smiled, charming and oddly seductive instead of goofy or manic. "I have all my memories of our life together, just as it seems you have yours. And believe me when I say that, in this body, retaining my memories is a feat in and of itself. There's a part of my brain which wants to ramble nonsense, but the more dominate part is preventing me from sounding completely idiotic."

"Whoa, what." Tim said, hand out as if he was going to physically stop the unmoving Doctor. "So you don't just have two lives in your head, you have two voices?"

"I have more than two lives in my mind, I have four. Two sets of memories for this body, one where I destroyed my planet, the other where I didn't, and those of my ninth and tenth selves. Though I suppose that doesn't really count as it was all linear to the proper reality. But yes, a secondary voice. The one that I should have."

"So I shouldn't complain, I guess." Tim said, taking another big drink from his pint.

"Can you tell us what's happening?" Rose asked the Doctor.

The Doctor furrowed his brow. "In what way?"

"Is this all real? Are we stuck here? Alternate reality and all?" Tim asked from where he continued to remain seated.

"I honestly don't know." The Doctor replied. "There's a heavy weight of wrong around us, but there's so much detail that I can't quite believe we made it up. There are things I could, indeed, imagine so vividly in sleep: the feel of Rose's skin, the taste and smell of Earth air, the way you look with a proper hair cut." He teased, and Tim absentmindedly put his fingers where his longer locks should have been. "But there are somethings my mind can't quite replicate, like the hum of the TARDIS." He stiffened, reaching in his pocket and withdrawing what was likely his sonic once more, pointing it near the table.

Another squeal, and Rose turned to see Tim flinching away from the elf doll as it flopped about on the table top.

"Or disturbing Christmas decor coming to life. Especially when their eyes go red and murderous."

Tim picked it up only to drop it again. "It's warm." He said, eyes wide. "Like it was alive."

Rose let go of the Doctor's hands to have a better look at the thing on the table. It still looked like it had a stuffed body, there was give as if it were only filling inside. The head, hands, and feet were plastic. But Tim was right, it felt as though there had been life within it.

The Doctor stepped up beside her, cylinder thing in hand as he ran it over the elf.

"What's that?" Rose asked, more teasing than curious as she was fairly certain she knew the answer.

"My sonic screwdriver," The Doctor replied without hesitation. "Bit different this go around, less flashy. Perhaps it's something I should consider the next time I'm made to sacrifice my sonic for the greater good."

"Good to know you're still rude." Rose mumbled to herself as she crossed her arms and watched the short, handsome body of her partner scan the thing.

"Hearing is still excellent as well, Love." He said with a bit of a grin, glancing at her from the corner of his eye with a mischievous twinkle. "It is a living creature, but not in the flesh sense. Sort of like weeping angel, maybe a bit like the Autons. I've stunned the poor creature, knocked it unconscious, but it will get up again soon."

"Right. So how do we stop it?" Rose asked.

The Doctor smiled, not so seductive this time but still charming "No idea." He admitted.

"Whoa, you okay, M.I.W.?" Tim said, drawing attention first to him and then to Donna.

She stood completely still, staring off into the distance, eyes glazed.

"Donna, are you alright?" The Doctor asked, letting go of Rose and moving toward their friend. He waved his hand in front of her face, but she did nothing. He flicked through the settings on the sonic before waving it around in front of Donna.

After nearly a minute she blinked. "Oi, stop blipping me." Donna said, suddenly back to this reality as she smacked the Doctor's hands away.

"Oh good, you're back." He said as he glanced at his sonic before pocketing it. "Scans show you were perfectly fine, though that was quite the holiday your mind had gone on. Feeling alright?"

Donna blinked, squinting. "Yeah. Sorry. Fine, just …." She shook her head as if to clear it. "We should all be heading back where we belong, shouldn't we?"

"TARDIS is parked across the street." The Doctor gestured.

"No, Dumbo, in our proper homes, in our sorta proper lives." Donna rolled her eyes as she folded her arms. "Gotta get the car back to my Mom eventually."

"And I suppose you need to be getting back to the Estates." The Doctor said wistfully, turning to Rose with a gentle smile. "Back to your mother, as I'm sure she's still here in this reality."

Rose sucked in a deep breath. "Umm, she is, yeah. But that's not who I live with." She bit her lip, cringing as she hoped the Doctor wouldn't make her say it out loud.

He looked confused, thoughtful, looking like he was running calculations in his head before his eyes went wide and then dark. "No," He said. "No, if you think for one moment I am letting you return to the bed and the arms of Mickey the Idiot."

"Well 's not like I'm going willingly, yeah? How am I supposed to explain running off one evening with a man he's never met before."

"Oh, I think I could make an introduction." The Doctor countered.

"She actually means me." Tim grinned.

"Timothy, I would tread quite carefully if I were you." The Doctor said politely over his shoulder before turning back to Rose. "How can you allow that to continue? I thought you said you remembered the world as it should be?"

"I'm not really allowing it to continue, I'm letting it die slowly. I can't just end a perfectly happy seeming relationship because I woke up with memories of another life. And I can't just up and leave 'im 'cause then I'd have my face on missing posters all over again."

"Guys," Tim said, stalling the argument. "The weird elf thing is gone."

Rose looked all around, under the table, loosely around the pub, finding no sign of the creepy thing.

"Fantastic." The Doctor said with exasperation, and it seemed to sound as funny to his ears as it had to Rose. "Well, I guess I'll know what I'll be doing the evening doing."

"Come on," Donna gestured to the door with her head. "Might as well take you two back to the flat while Spaceman here chases a doll around London."

"You think that will be the only one?" He challenged her.

"Not bloody likely, but that's the one that caught your attention." Donna smirked.

* * *

 

The room was blurred, out of focus. Heart monitors, she heard heart monitors.

So tired, so very tired. Should just close her eyes….

"The Doctor is taking longer to get into the dream state than the others." She heard a male voice say. Not one she knew.

"Higher metabolism." That female voice was familiar but not known. She didn't know her. "Better shielding in his mind. Doesn't matter, he just needs to stay sedated for now."

"Why'd the human go out so easily?" Someone new asked.

All she wanted was to close her eyes, to sleep. No, stay conscious. Something's not right here, she knows. Another reality where things weren't right and the answers were here. Waiting. But oh sleep would be nice.

"Scans show his mind has been recently assaulted. Unwanted telepathic contact, made him more sensitive." A pause. "He's out. Entirely. See? Brain waves are showing he believes in the other world. He's cemented in it."

"Why don't we just kill him now while he's like this?" Another new voice asked. "Easy enough to get him to go through the remainder of his regenerations. I even heard that if you kill a Time Lord quick enough, they are prevented from regenerating at all."

"Because we'd cause a paradox." The familiar woman retorted sharply. "One thing you should know is you shouldn't mess with time like that. If we kill him now, he doesn't go to the Pandorica. There's no reason for it to be built in the first place, and we'd have no reason to run our little tests, would we? So no, nit wit, we aren't going to kill him." A huff, like she's collecting herself. "Start her scans, and draw some blood. I need to know as much about Bad Wolf as I can."

"Ma'am, this one's patch fell off."

"Well then put it back on." The female voice said as if she was talking to an idiot. And maybe she was. Idiots, the whole lot of them. Minions to an evil Madman. Madwoman. Was there such a thing?

A sticky patch stuck to her neck and blissful sleep washed over Donna once again.

* * *

 

Rose's eyes opened as she heard the TARDIS outside her building. She'd slept on the futon, her and Tim staying up beyond when Mickey went to bed. Her fake brother offered to sleep in her spot for her, and she took the futon so she wouldn't have to endure a night next to Mickey after having found the Doctor.

It would make sneaking out that much easier.

Getting up, she slipped on her slippers and her winter jacket before heading outside. She spotted it half hiding around the corner of her building next to the dumpsters, and ran for it. With no key, she did the only thing she thought she could do to get the Old Girl to open up for her: she snapped her fingers.

The door opened.

She ran inside, pausing much like she had the first time entered the TARDIS. The part of her mind that still wanted her to cling to this reality was freaked out by the size. The rest of her was more taken aback by the look of the console room.

"She's different." She finally said, looking over and finding the Doctor in a reading chair, feet propped up on a foot stool, looking back at her.

"Didn't destroy her with an explosive regeneration." He said with a faint hint of a smile. "I didn't expect to see you just yet."

"Oh?" Rose said as she shed her jacket, finding it odd that there were no rails to drape it over. The TARDIS provided her a coat rack, and she absentmindedly hung up her jacket before moving toward the Doctor, eyes taking in the Gothic setting.

She would never dare point out that he had, in fact, had carpets. She'd hate to give him a hearts attack.

"I thought I would pop by in the morning, introduce myself. This is, perhaps, for the best."

"Yeah?" Rose asked, turning to see him smiling back at her with amusement.

"Probably saved myself from a lot of grief. I don't think I would have been too subtle in my claim on you."

She chuckled as she moved to stand in front of him, stepping over one of his propped up legs to stand between them and making him look up at her. His hands went up and gripped her thighs, and she placed hers on his shoulders.

"Do you love me in this world?" He asked softly, his fear at the answer clear in the blue depths that stared back at her.

She bent down and pressed her lips to his, sighing at finally having connected with him like that again. It remained chaste, but she felt his fingers dig in, pulling her down to sit on his lap. She complied but pulled back to look at him as she did.

"Before I woke up with my memories? No, I didn't because I didn't know you. I fantasized about you, the man who saved me from an exploding building. I didn't really remember what you looked like, so I made up an image to go with it. But I didn't love you. Not until four days ago when I realized who I was. It's funny," She said, dragging her fingers along the lapels of his jacket. "My life here was exactly the same up until I met you, and then I did things to make it better. But I know I felt like I was missing something."

"And now?" he asked brushing her hair back and purposely grazing her temple. She felt the brush of his mind on hers, making her shiver.

"Now I want to know how we got here, and if we're stuck here."

"I don't know." He shook his head, "But if it's easier for you in this life for me to leave you with Mickey…."

"That wouldn't be easier. Not now, not knowing. And if we do end up stuck here I want to be with you." She pressed her forehead to his. Then she chuckled, brushing her nose against his. "Besides, best for me to get acquainted with this body when it won't mess time lines too badly, yeah?" She smiled, tongue stuck between her teeth as she pulled away to see his reaction.

Her smiled quickly dropped.

And she thought his tenth body had a way for looking all the world like a seducer.

"This body was a bit of a lover." He said casually, his grin anything but.

"Yeah?" She swallowed hard, finding her mind racing as quickly as her heart rate picked up.

"Yes," He said as he leaned in slowly, eyes focused on her mouth. His lips pressed firmly against hers, and Rose knew she wouldn't be returning to the flat any time during the night.

* * *

 

Better rested. Not so groggy. Head hurting though. So many bright lights. Christmas? No, no, space ship. Heart monitors, humming.

"Remarkable." There was that voice again, that familiar female one that Donna knew she knew but didn't know how. "She's got Huon's embedded in her DNA. So that's how she became so powerful."

"Do you think if we'll be able to achieve the same level of power she had when she…?" This voice sounded more like a boy whose voice was changing.

"I don't think we'd ever be able to achieve that kind of power, but if we can replicate the huons in her system, we may be able to …."

"Ma'am, this dream patch isn't sticking properly." The voice was right next to her ear.

"Stick on a new one. We won't be finished for at least another hour. I want to make sure I get every ounce of data I can."

Donna faintly heard something being peeled, then something cold and sticky was pressed firmly into her neck.

She tried really, really hard to stay coherent, but she just couldn't keep her eyes open.

* * *

 

Rose crept back into the flat just after seven in the morning feeling exhausted and guilty. Tea would help with the former as there was no question as to why she had gotten virtually no sleep. The latter just made her head spin, because not only was a small part of her guilty for cheating on Mickey, but another part of her felt like she cheated on the Doctor with the Doctor.

There were differences, many differences that she didn't dare point out but cataloged and reviewed as she went about making tea. Differences in his body and techniques that weren't better or worse than the Doctor she'd known so intimately, just different.

All she could hope for was that if they ever got back to the proper reality she'd be able to remember what happened here just as well.

"Why's your brother in our bed?" Mickey asked, and Rose startled having not heard him come into the kitchen.

"Didn't want him sleeping on this lumpy ol' thing." She said with a breathy laugh as she prepared three cups of tea. Tim would likely be up soon.

"And you thought it was a good idea to send 'im in our room while I was sleeping?"

"Well there was no need to kick you outta bed." Rose countered.

"I woke up spooning 'im." Mickey said flatly, and Rose snorted in an effort to stop herself from laughing. "'S not funny. An' he better not be into that sorta thing 'cause I'm only about one Tyler, and she's a she."

"Oh, come off it." She said as she popped a couple slices of bread in the toaster. "It's only for a few days, then everything will return to normal." She said, hoping with every ounce of her being that she was right.

Mickey moved to put his arms around her, and she swiftly deflected the contact. She could still smell the Doctor on her skin, and her lips were still a bit bruised from her night with him.

"Rose, what's goin' on?" He asked her, and she couldn't look him in the eye. "You've been distant lately."

"'S nothing." She reassured.

"You sure? 'Cause I know," He sighed. "I know that we've been together for a while, and with Shareen getting hitched in Vegas last month." She did? "And Keisha telling you her and her bloke are expecting." She was? "That it's seeming like we're not going anywhere."

"It's fine." Rose snapped back, regretting it instantly because that was her moment to break things off, free and clear, and she let it go.

"I just want to say that we are. Or, at least I'm planning on that." Mickey once again made to hold her.

An overly loud yawn from the hallway stopped him.

"Hey, Wolf Girl." He said sleepily, scratching as his head before reaching for the cup Rose extended in his direction. He took a sip. "I missed this. Really did. Real frackin' tea … Oh!" He said, eyes opening a little wider. "Didn't mean to say that. Guess the TAR …" He stopped, eyes going wide as he realized where he was. "Tarnished reputation I had from all that swearing I used to do is something I finally want to fix." He said with a nod to Mickey. "Yeah, there's that. Language, I needed to watch that." He said, taking another sip of his tea. "So you're quite the cuddler, there, Mickey." He said, causing Mickey's cheeks to darken quite a bit.

"Didn't know it was you." He grumbled.

"It's okay, you're not the first person who snuggled up to me while thinking of someone else, and I doubt you'll be the last." He commented with a smirk. Mickey sneered, picked up his tea, and grumbled about checking the scores. He moved to the computer, and seemed to make a good show of ignoring what he thought were two siblings standing in his kitchen area.

The toast popped. "Take those, I'm going to hop in the shower." Rose said, swallowing back most of her tea.

"Yeah, you smell like a Time Lord." Tim said very casually. Rose's cheeks heated up as her fake brother smirked. "I heard it land too, you know." He said as he reached for the toast she said he could have.

Rose didn't say anything as she made her escape to the bathroom.

In and out as quick as she could be, dressed and ready for the day, she returned to the living space to see Mickey still on the computer and pointedly ignoring the man he thought was Rose's brother. Tim was looking at something on his phone, cup of tea in hand, and dressed for the day having grabbed a shower when they returned to the flat the night before.

"So what's the plan, Wolf Girl? Or did that not come up last night?" He asked without looking up, keeping his voice casual while Rose could tell there were many inappropriate things he wanted to say behind his eyes.

"Why do you call her that?" Mickey half snapped, glaring at Tim over his shoulder.

"Inside joke, you wouldn't understand." He replied as if he was bored. He looked up when there was a knock on the door. "Gee, wonder who that is."

Rose blushed a bit, cleared her throat, and went to answer the door.

The Doctor was leaning up against the hallway wall, looking at his sonic before glancing up. "Hello," He said.

"Hello," Rose replied stepping aside and letting him in.

He looked around, sonic still out but no longer his focus. "Flat's not terrible," He commented. "I can see where there was some subtle influence from the proper reality bleeding through. Still, I can see where there can be a lot of improvement."

"And who the bloody hell are you, coming in here and insulting my home?" Mickey asked as he stood up from his chair and tried to look intimidating. It may have worked if the Doctor had been a normal bloke. Mickey was the taller of the two, and while Rose knew what muscle definition lay under those layers of cashmere and leather on the Doctor, Mickey did look stronger as well.

The Doctor chuckled in his throat, looking Mickey over. "The worst thing that ever happened to you in two lifetimes." He said in a cocky manner.

"Doctor," Rose warned.

"Was quite rude of me, wasn't it?" He said a bit sheepishly, not breaking eye contact with Mickey. "Right, I'm the Doctor. And I think it's best we cut to the chase because from this moment on your world is going to change drastically. I'm a 909 year old alien. Well, I suppose in this reality I'm actually 899, but what's a decade among friends? I'm here on this planet investigating an alien invasion, and when I'm finished I'll be taking Rose Tyler with me in my ship and spending the rest of the time we are stuck in this reality with her. Do you have any questions?" He asked, with an air of politeness that made the whole confession seem like completely mundane conversation.

"Oh, ho, ho, snap." Tim said, taking a sip of his tea as he pocketed his phone. "Can't get any more clear about marking your territory than that, eh Doc?"

"Timothy, I really wish you wouldn't call me that." The Doctor sighed. "I'm aware that my older self doesn't care, and he's currently protesting in my mind, but I in this body would much prefer if you refer to me as Doctor."

"You know this clown?" Mickey growled.

"Yeah, I do." Tim smirked.

"Wait a moment." The Doctor's brow furrowed before he turned to Tim. He inspected him from a distance, glanced to the small bag off to the side, then looked back at him. "You're well off in this reality, so why are you here so early? You should be in a posh hotel across town."

"Rose's big brother stay wouldn't stay in some hotel while he's visiting for the holidays." He replied.

The Doctor turned back to Mickey. "And you believed that?" Mickey shrugged and gave a little nod. "You're a bigger idiot than I remembered."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Mickey crossed his arms.

"It means if you really believed that Rose somehow has a sibling …." The Doctor started, but a mug smashing on the floor stopped him mid sentence and drew the attention of everyone in the flat.

The mug which Mickey had had on the desk was now in shards on the floor.

"Guys, do you hear that?" Tim asked nervously, and Rose paused and listened.

"That's actually the other reason I came up here." The Doctor said, lifting his sonic, the red nub on the end spinning. "There's one of those creatures in here."

"Creatures?" Mickey asked.

"That bloody elf." Rose cursed, moving around into the living room to see if it was in the tree where she saw it the night before.

"You mean the one you keep moving when I'm not around?" Mickey asked.

"I don't touch the bloody thing." Rose said as she got down on her hands and knees and looked under the futon when it became apparent the elf was not hiding in the tree.

"Careful, Love." The Doctor cautioned just as she noticed a tiny box perched just under the cushion.

"Love?" Mickey choked out as Rose reached for it, opening the thing where no one could see her do it.

"Indeed." The Doctor replied, the whir of the sonic filling the silence that Rose wouldn't have been able to fill if they wanted her to. She could feel Mickey's eyes on her, but she couldn't pull her eyes away from the ring sitting in the box with its twinkling diamond taunting her with what this reality had expected.

Until the choking started.

Rose whipped her head up and saw the disturbing little elf thing with it's arms around Tim's neck from behind. It's eyes were red, and it's smile was disturbingly evil. Tim was trying to pull the tiny arms away from this throat, gasping and clawing as his legs started to shake.

* * *

 

"Information is saved, we're ready to go." A man said. Donna's eyes barely opened, the room of the space ship barely in focus making it so that only silhouettes were seen.

"Good. Those patches should leave them in the dream reality for a few more days, they'll never know what happened." That woman, who ever she was, said with confidence as cases clicked shut.

"Days?" A man said nervously. "How many are we talking?"

A pause. "The woman is not the one we need to concern ourselves with to maintain time lines, and I've no clue who the man is. If they die, well, I'm not sure we have to worry about that too much, do we? The Doctor never seemed to trouble himself with such things."

Death? No bloody way. She struggled to move, lifting her hand, her fingers falling against her neck but not gaining any purchase. She tried again, and again, and once more until something pulled at the skin of her throat like a bandage being ripped off. The sticky patch fell from her fingers as she dropped her hand, and after a few seconds, Donna felt a little more aware.

"Let me help." That man who sounded nervous said. She felt a pull from the other side of her neck and her mind cleared that much more.

She was able to see clearly after a few blinks though her eye lids still felt heavy with the need to sleep. As she focused, she found the man she saw the night of the Adipose invasion standing before her. His own eyes looked heavy like he was fighting sleep, but he managed to help her to an upright position before half collapsing on the bed.

"Don't have much time." Mickey, she remembered, said to her urgently. "You gotta get the patches off 'em. Gotta get 'em outta here and you gotta get to Earth."

"Why?" Donna asked weakly.

"Stars." Mickey said, shaking his head. "Sorry," he said lifting himself and staggering away. "Just … Earth." And before he could say more he was gone. Just gone, like he'd never been there.

Donna's head spun, and she collapsed back on the bed.


	29. Life is But a Dream

"Tim," Rose said, darting for him with the ring still in hand.

"I've got it, Sweetheart," The Doctor said firmly extending one arm to block her from moving forward and thrusting the sonic toward Tim.

The elf looked like it was struggling to hold on before it eventually gave up, dropping to the ground and covering its ears. It glared at the Doctor, the smile turning into a sneer.

Rose reached for the pile of dishes left on the drying rack, grabbed a heavy frying pan and swung just as the elf made a leap for the Doctor. There was a sickening thunk as it made contact with the cast iron, and it dropped to the floor with it's head on the wrong way and it's limbs all tangled.

Everyone stood around in silence as they collected themselves, Rose looking to Tim as she bent with her occupied hands on her knees. He nodded as he coughed, gripping the kitchen counter as he struggled to catch his breath. As Rose righted herself, she dropped the pan and thew her arms around the Doctor's neck as he pulled her toward him, gripping her fiercely. She breathed him in, his scent with the leather and something else she couldn't figure out but knew was distinct to the body he currently had.

"My precious girl." He sighed, stepping back. "You're not death proof here, you have to be more careful."

Rose snorted. "Only had been for the last five years. Always been jeopardy friendly, me." She grinned with her tongue between her teeth.

"Yes, but you have become too used to being unbreakable." He said with a grin, tapping her playfully on the nose. "Can't go throwing yourself in to danger now."

"Pretty sure I've already done that." She flirted, feeling the fingers still at her waist dig into her.

"What the bloody hell is going on?" Mickey said evenly, causing the Doctor and Rose to step abruptly away from each other with matching guilty looks. Mickey looked too in shock to really have any anger or suspicion, but he was still looking between the couple, the doll on the floor, and the thing still in Rose's hand. "You weren't supposed to find that." He said.

Rose looked at the box, to the hurt in the Doctor's eyes, then to Mickey. She closed the box. "Sorry," She said, tossing it over to him.

He caught it without seeming to think about it, his gaze still distant. "Is that a 'no' then?"

"Mickey," She said, wringing her fingers.

"How long you been messing around on me?" He asked, anger finally cropping up. "And with an older bloke, too. What are you, forty?"

"I already told you," The Doctor said in a relatively calm voice.

"Yeah, well, what ever. You look like you're forty, which is too old for Rose. And if you really are an alien, where do you get off coming down to Earth and stealing people's girlfriends, eh?"

"Well, this is the second time I've done it to you." He countered cheekily, his charming grin meaning to disarm though Rose could see it had the opposite affect.

"We were happy," Mickey said, turning his attention to Rose and losing some of his steam. "We were good. What's he give you that I can't? Huh? He says he's an alien."

"I can't really explain it," Rose apologized as much as she could. "And if I could, you'd never believe me. It's just, well, I belong with the Doctor."

"Yeah, suppose the Canuck's not really your brother, is he?" He said bitterly.

"What ever, Tin Dog." Tim said absently, his voice hoarse. He was on the phone, looking nervous. "Donna's not answering."

"There's another one of yous in this mess?" Mickey folded his arms.

"I'm surprised that of all the things you're currently dwelling on you have failed to acknowledge that a decoration just tried to strangle your house guest." The Doctor commented, looking at Mickey suspiciously. "Why is that?"

"Probably because it's likely your bloody fault anyway." Mickey snapped back.

"Guys! Donna's not answering." Tim reiterated. "Not her cell, not her house phone, nothing." He ended the call and pocketed his phone, looking between all three. "I don't have any real insight here, but something tells me that's not supposed to be happening."

"We should go to her home, then." The Doctor said, bending down and scooping up the elf. "And while we make the hop over I'll run some tests to find out what's going on with these things."

"Let's go." Tim nodded, following th Doctor as he headed for the door.

Rose made to follow but was stopped by Mickey's hand gripping her wrist. "Babe, stay." He said. It wasn't a plea, but an ultimatum. She could see in his eyes it was one he didn't want to be making, and likely one he'd go back on like he seemed to do so many times before when she ran off with her original leather clad Doctor. But she couldn't do that to him again, even if the part of her mind engrossed in the reality told her she was making the wrong decision.

She stepped up to him and kissed his cheek. "You deserve so much better than me." She admitted before pulling out of his grip, grabbing her jacket and shoes, and running after the Doctor.

* * *

 

She was weak as she pulled herself back up, her head pounding from what Donna could guess was a mix of being drugged and her head falling back on the hard bed. There were no sounds in the room except for the breaths of her friends and the hum of the vents. She looked around, seeing none of the equipment she knew she heard as she came in and out of consciousness. Tim was the closest to her, only a bed over. Rose was on the far end, the Doctor in the bed next to her.

Donna swung her shakey legs over the edge of the bed, wobbling as she tried to stay on them. She fell forward, slumping against Tim's bed where she tried to keep herself up right.

The patch on his neck caught the light in the room, it's clear material not blending in as well as it was probably supposed to. She stared at it, narrowing her gaze as she noted white writing.

Dream State 37.

What the bloody hell was that about? With as much effort as she could muster, she lifted her hand and reached for the patch, her fingers brushing against Tim's neck in much of the same motions she used to try to get her patch off before. She had had help then, though she couldn't really recall who. One of the henchmen for the woman who was doing what ever it was she was doing, Donna supposed. Someone who felt bad for their predicament and wanted to help as much as he could.

Eventually she caught the edge of the patch and peeled it off, feeling the wave of dizziness try to take over before she managed to shake the thing loose.

Slowly, Tim's eyes fluttered open, and he groaned.

One down, two to go.

* * *

 

"Nothing." The Doctor said with exasperation, running his hand through his hair in a manner that was very distinctly his tenth body's habit but didn't look half bad on this one. "It's like it's not real. But it has to be. It climbed a counter and jumped up to strangle you." He looked to Tim as if he wanted the other man's opinion as Rose sat in the arm chair she'd found the Doctor in the night before.

"It felt real enough." Tim commented as he stared at the little elf doll sitting on the console. "Always hated elf things. My grandmother had one, more rigid, just as creepy."

"It doesn't make sense for it to simply be murderous." Rose rationalized. "It's got to be alien, and it's got to want something." She smirked. "Holiday tradition and all."

"Yes," The Doctor said thoughtfully, leaning forward with both hands on the console. "And you said she remembered the various invasions that still plagued this reality. Which is strange because our Donna did not. She always glossed over it, like it was something minor that could be easily missed."

"So maybe we should go see her now?" Tim suggested.

"Maybe we should." The Doctor went about the console, flipping switches and making adjustments before he stopped and met Rose's eye. "You've no idea how to pilot her, do you?"

Rose shook her head, the heavy weight of sadness making it impossible to smile even the slightest. "Don't even feel her in my mind." She said quietly.

"She hates it too." The Doctor reassured before finishing his task and getting them out of the Vortex.

When the TARDIS came to a shuddering stop, they all stepped outside on to the suburban street in Chiswick. They looked at the large home familiar to Rose and the Doctor and watched for any sign of life. The for sale sign in the front yard wasn't a sight they'd wanted to see, and Rose linked her hand in the Doctor's as they strode up to the house. Peeking into the windows, there was no furniture that Rose could see in any of the rooms, no light from anywhere but the windows.

"You two interested?" A voice called from the yard next door. Rose turned at the same time the Doctor had, and the old woman that called to them seemed taken aback. "Didn't expect to see quite so much of an age difference." She commented.

The Doctor looked to Rose. "I didn't think I looked that much older in this body." She smirked and shrugged. He turned back to the old woman with a charming smile. "Worth waiting for the right one though." He said as he led Rose over to the hedge that separated what should have been the Noble residence from the old woman's lawn. "What can you tell me about the owners?"

"Oh, tragic that." She said with complete sincerity. "They all passed in that invasion. The one with all those robots and things. You know the one, the pepper pots and such." The old woman wrung her hands, looking at the house like it was haunted.

"When was that?" The Doctor asked, earning a nervous gaze from the old woman. "I had surgery and there was a … complication. Memory hasn't been quite the same since." He explained.

"About two years ago." She replied. "The woman's father lived here until a couple months ago when he passed himself."

"Wilf." Rose breathed out, her heart in her throat.

"Yes," The woman said with more perk. "Did you know him?"

"No," The Doctor smiled, changing which of his hands was holding Rose's so he could wrap his arm around her shoulders. "Thank you, Madam. We'll be on our way." He said as he started guiding Rose back toward the TARDIS.

"It's not possible for Donna to have died two years ago when she was working with me these last four days. She was just with us last night." Rose rushed out.

"I know, Love, but right now I think we have more important things to worry about." He said urgently as he guided her back into the TARDIS. When the doors were closed he finally let go of her, rushing to the console and moving them away.

"Like what?" Rose asked, moving to stand beside him.

"Like why there are elf dolls who are alive but not. Why they're attacking us, and seemingly only us. Why we're here in the first place. And most pressing at the moment: where did Tim go?"

Rose looked around the console room, only just realizing that their companion was not with them. He had been outside, but she knew he wouldn't have just wondered away. Actually, it was odd that he didn't simply come with them. He wasn't by the TARDIS when they returned, and what was worse, she didn't even notice.

"What would have been all our deepest desires before meeting one another?" He challenged. "Tim wanted a better life than the one he and his aunt were dealt. I don't know much about his life in this reality but he looked all the world like he was not lacking for anything. You wanted to escape the Estates, you've said so yourself. Remember? You said coming with me was likely the only way you'd have ever gotten out but in this reality it was proven wrong. And me …."

"You never destroyed Gallifrey." Rose realized. "You hid it instead of destroying it. You don't have the guilt you carried around for so long."

"And for the time in this reality before I remembered who you were I was fine. Carefree. I mourned the ones who died in hiding it, but I didn't dwell on the emptiness in my mind because I knew if it returned it meant the worst was happening." He moved around to stand in front of her, gripping her hands. "Donna's gone, supposedly having never existed. You know what my first impulse was? To find out why. It was a distraction, something that stopped me from wondering why we're here and how it happened. Like the doll. We're living a nightmare masked as a dream, thought to be reality. And I have no idea how to get us out of here."

* * *

 

Donna's strength was returning, though it didn't seem like Tim was going to be moving anytime soon.

"You alright, Psychboy?" She asked him, brushing his hair from his forehead in a tender, motherly gesture.

He laughed. "I'll live, Time Lady. Frack." He rubbed at his temples. "What the hell happened to us? Why are we back here, how did we get out of the reality?"

Donna shrugged. "I don't know. I don't … I don't really remember it." She realized, brow knitting together as she tried to put the hazy pieces together. A different looking Doctor and an elf thing were the only two points that stood out.

"Probably for the best." Tim groaned. "I know I'm going to burn any and all elf decorations I see from this point on in my life. Frack, that was messed up. I will miss the money, though. Nice to think of a life that wasn't such a struggle on so many levels."

Donna smiled, understanding where he came from even though she was pretty sure she didn't really remember it being all that spectacular.

"Hold tight, I'm going to get the patch off the Doctor," She told Tim, giving his arm a squeeze before she got to her feet.

Her legs still weren't all that strong, and she had to brace herself against the beds as she moved slowly toward the Time Lord. He looked peaceful, all things considered. All the weight of the Universe was off his shoulders as he was in such a deep sleep. It broke her heart the whole way over to him that she would have to get him out of it, Wishing she felt it was safe enough for him to stay in it a while longer.

As she got to him, she moved up to his neck, running her fingers along his cool skin until she felt the plastic-life texture beneath her finger tips. Finding the edge, she ripped the patch off.

The Doctor's eyes opened instantly, wide and and alert.

"Rose," he said, bolting up and getting on his feet before pausing and catching himself from falling over. He looked up and around, shaking his head as if to clear it before smiling at Donna. "Hello!" he said with a wide, manic grin. "Fancy seeing you here, coming to our rescue and all that?"

"Well, seemed like I owed you one." Donna said with a shrug, trying no to tease the Time Lord too much. "How about you stay here and get yourself sorted, and I'll help Rose, sound good?"

The Doctor went to take a step, but his legs crossed over themselves and his knees partly buckled. "Yeah, sure, brilliant idea." He said.

Donna chuckled, feeling a bit relieved as she managed to move with more strength to Rose.

* * *

 

The tiny cackle was terrifying enough, but then a small, high voiced began to sing. "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way."

The Doctor stepped closer, pulling Rose protectively into his arms.

"Oh what fun it is to make you die…." It never finished its song, too busy laughing gleefully at itself.

"Not the most creative creature, are you." The Doctor taunted, looking around the console room, pulling her closer.

"Only when it comes to songs," It said in a sing song voice. "I'm very creative in other ways."

"I don't think you are," The Doctor said with a ghost of a smile. "Because you're a compilation of the various things Rose Tyler and I have faced. An image that our companion feared. You're not real, none of this is real. You can't kill us, because you can't hurt us."

"Want to put that theory to the test?" It taunted, the voice coming from somewhere under the console now. It laughed, somewhat like a child's giggle, and the Doctor backed up with Rose in his arms.

"Is it true?" She asked him. "I can't tell if you're lying."

"Tell her, tell her." It taunted, and Rose thought she saw a flash of red move to the other side of the room.

"Doctor?" She asked him, meeting his eye.

He didn't answer. Instead, he kissed her firmly before pressing his forehead to hers. "I have a theory," he said softly. "One I'm willing to test, but unwilling to have you involved in."

"Doctor."

"No, Rose, listen. If this isn't real, if this is a dream than I think I know how we can escape it. But in case I'm not, in case I'm wrong, I want you to run. I want you to go as deep into the TARDIS as possible, and if she can she will protect you."

"This is crazy." She protested.

"It is." He agreed. "But it may be our only chance." He brushed his thumb against her temple. "I wish I could establish a link, part of our bond, make it so that we can share a mind."

"See, you should have bonded with me sooner." She teased, ignoring the cackled getting closer for the moment.

"I should have. And I will." He kissed her quickly. "Now go."

He shoved her toward large, ornate doors that opened for her and closed behind her, locking her into the corridor as Rose did as she told and ran. It looked so plain, all things considered. Like a gothic castle but with not details anywhere, not even the seal she'd seen over the doors she dashed through. She ran, like going aimlessly through a maze, moving with the twists and turns, all while feeling blind without the guiding hum of the TARDIS in her mind.

And worst of all, no matter where she made her feet carry her, for matter how far she seemed to get, it always sounded like that wicked little laugh was right behind her.

She eventually came to a dead end that included a door that would not open baring the first familiar symbols she'd seen since being on this TARDIS and in it's corridors. It was familiar in a way that made her heart wrench, but just strange enough that she didn't understand why.

She pounded on the door. "Let me in!" She cried to the ceiling. "Let me in, let me in."

The laugh was in her ear, it's arms around her neck, and she gasped.

Rose's eyes flew open and stared up at Donna with disbelief. Then she cried, laughing in relief as the tears came freely and she bolted up, wrapping her arms around her friend's neck. "You're alive." She laughed as Donna hesitantly held her back.

"'Course I am. Could never be rid of me so easily." She reassured, patting Rose's back.

When Donna let go of her, Rose looked over at the Doctor. Her tall, thin, great haired Doctor with warm brown eyes. He grinned, and she smiled. "Blimey it's good to see you like this again." She said as she got off the bed and stumbled into his arms. He caught her around the waist, pulling her toward him. His fingers went under her shirt, grazing her back and igniting the partial bond they shared.

"I'd come say hi too, but I'm still fighting the vertigo." Tim called from behind the Doctor, and Rose looked around him to see their other companion resting on a partly inclined bed.

"What happened to us?" She asked, smiling at Tim before looking at the Doctor. He stepped back a bit, lifting his hand and showing Rose a clear patch.

"Dream State 37," He said as if it was the only explanation he had to give. "This patch is dried up, no good, but normally within seconds of it coming in contact with your skin you go into a state of subconscious. A dose this strong would have you believing what ever the dream you were having was real. And for that to happen it has to be grounded with reality. Something your mind could easily imagine."

"But we all had the same dream." Donna noted, "We all stayed connected."

"That's because of the ingredients used to make Dream State 37. Usually these mood patches are composed of synthetic hormones and natural boosters but this, this little thing is made of some potent stuff. Psychic pollen from the meadows of Karass don Salva. Candle meadows, actually, beautiful place. Romantic place, but dangerous. I'll have to show you sometimes, Sweetheart, when the plants aren't so proactive in their pollination."

"And that's what made us all have the same dream?" Tim asked, getting to his feet carefully.

"No, that would be the second ingredient found only in the high grade stuff. Dream crab, or rather the dust of its body after it's died. Dream crabs would latch on, put you in a comatose state, give you a dream you never want to leave while slowly turning your brain to soup."

"Lovely," Donna grimaced.

"Yes. Dying species that lot, which is why these particular patches would have been more difficult to come by. When people are being attacked by a dream crab they don't realize it. Not only is the dream one you never want to leave, you don't even realize it's not real. But you know what's really, really interesting about these?" He asked, turning to Rose. "They came from New Earth. High end, black market mood patch. Remember pharmacy town? How I shut the place down after we all left the senate? It never opened back up, you know what that tells me?" He asked her, becoming more and more serious with every word. Rose merely shook her head. "Who ever attacked us was a time traveler. And if I remember the last bits I heard before succumbing to the dormientes, it's a time traveler who has a grudge against Time Lords. In particularly: me."

"But we're safe now, right?" Donna asked. "They're gone, we're all out of the … whatever you call it. We don't have to worry about it anymore, yeah?"

The Doctor nodded, but Rose could tell that he was filing away the event for future reference. Someone was after him, and if their prejudice was against all Time Lords than they'd have to check on Jenny far more often than they had been.

"Well, my head is killing me." Tim said after a moment of somewhat uncomfortable silence.

"Mine too," Donna said, looking at Rose in confusion. "Why's yours not. I know Spaceman here would just boast his superiorness, but you?"

"I dunno." She shrugged. "But honestly I feel fine. Great even."

"Let me see." The Doctor said, hovering his finger near her temple. She rolled her eyes, and he seemed to get that it was her way of granting permission.

His presence filled her mind as she closed her eyes, and while they'd already had contact through their bond it became that much stronger.

"You're right, it appears as though you are suffering no side effects." He said in her mind.

She hummed out loud. "I never want to not feel this again." She said, reaching up and putting her fingers on his temples filling his mind as well. "I never want to be forced into another reality where I can't feel this connection with you."

"Yeah?"

"Yes."

"Then bond with me." He said out loud, and Rose opened her eyes to see him staring back into hers.

"What?" She asked, not sure she was hearing him right.

He eased out her mind, reached up for her hands and took them in his own. "Bond with me. We do, we'll never have to face that again. Even if we somehow ended up in another dream state, it would never be able to alter that."

Rose hesitated. "Are you asking me? Properly?"

He smirked. "Let me put it in a way you understand." He said, getting down on one knee. "Rose Tyler, would you do me the honor of becoming my bond mate?"

He probably didn't have to sound so cheeky when he said it, and maybe it would have been better to have had him do it on Woman Wept where it was just the two of them and they weren't in a room where'd they'd been drugged. But wasn't it just so them? So perfectly, wonderfully them that this was the moment her daft alien finally chose to ask the question she'd been waiting for for five years.

She smiled, tongue between her teeth and leaned forward. "Why not?" She asked, giving him her proper answer through their bond, and he was on his feet and pulling her into his arms in a tight hug, laughing excitedly.

"Wait, what just happened?" Tim asked, and they broke apart for Rose to see his genuine confusion and Donna's tear stained joy.

"What just happened, Tim my boy, is we just started planning a wedding." The Doctor grinned manically. "To the TARDIS," he declared, gripping Rose's hand tightly. "We have some people we need to pick up."

* * *

 

"Gun's loaded?" Jake asked Mickey as the former looked over the weapon in his hand one more time.

"Better be." He replied, taking a couple deep breaths. "Got a lock on 'em now, should be easier to find 'em this jump."

"We don't have much choice, do we? Stars are gone, the other Universe'll catch up soon. We don't get over there, get the Doctor to do something, we're in trouble aren't we?" Jake shifted around, knowing why Mickey was waiting to make the jump.

He took a deep breath, then another, then a third to be safe.

"Out with it." Mickey snapped, and Jake met his eye.

"You better come back." He said simply.

Mickey shrugged. "May not." He admitted, now avoiding Jake's gaze.

"You already know she's happy, she's with him, why would you want to stay there?" Jake asked, fearing the answer as much as he wanted it.

"Got nothing left for me here. Gram's gone."

"And what about the Tylers? What about me?" Jake looked away. It wasn't Rickey, he'd never be Rickey.

He felt Mickey's hand on his shoulders, and looked up to see the understanding in the man's eyes. "We made a good team," he said. "But you'll never be happy if I stick around."

"Could be." Jake said with a shrug, hearing the voices of the Tylers coming closer. Mickey just smile, a little warmer this time, then stood straighter as their boss came in.

"Jacks, it's not necessary for you to go." Pete pleaded with Tony on his hip. "You know the Doctor would bring Mickey back when it's over, you don't have to put yourself in the middle of the gun fire just to see Rose. You could stay here at Torchwood, wait."

"To hell with waiting," Jackie countered, looking fierce with gun slung over her shoulder despite the expensive looking tracksuit. "She's my daughter, Pete, and I never got a proper goodbye. I need to hear from her lips that's she's alright or see with my own eyes that she's alive. I lost you ages ago, and while finding you and having Tony has been one of the best things that's ever happened to me it meant losing the only other thing that mattered to me. I've got to do this, and like hell are you stopping me."

Pete looked like he wanted to argue but couldn't find the words.

Jackie nodded, seeing he understood, the moved the gun to hold out her arms for Tony. The toddler went into her arms, allowing her to hug him and smother him with kisses despite looking all the world confused by what was happening. "Mum loves you, Tony. Always." She said to the boy before handing him back to Pete. "And I love you, always." She said before giving him a long kiss goodbye.

"Be careful, Jacks." Pete said as she stepped away from him, joining Mickey on the canon platform.

Jake took a breath.

"Final launch of the dimension canon in 3, 2, 1." He pushed the button, and Mickey and Jackie disappeared.

"Bye, mummy." He heard Tony's little voice say, and the toddler's words broke him. Tears went down his eyes, and the weight of the possibility never seeing Mickey again was simply too much to take.


	30. The Stolen Earth

"Isn't having visited ancient Montebella the day the planet fell sorta cheating when it comes to finding artifacts?" Jenny asked Melody after her roommate and best friend told her about the trip she and a few others from her class were preparing to take.

Melody shrugged. "Perhaps," She said with a smirk. "But when you've been raised by what is essentially two sets of time travelers it's hard to not have first hand information on history. Besides, it's more fun when no one gets how you can be so clever at such a young age."

Jenny arched a brow. "You're nearly fifty two."

"And yet I don't look a day over twenty." Melody fluffed her curls, and the girls laughed.

Jenny knew. She knew all there was to know about Melody Pond, the name she had chosen to go by after accidentally running into Jenny's parents when she wasn't meant to, and how absolutely important it was for her to never tell her Mum and Dad the truth. They would learn eventually, Melody assured, but for now she was to not say a thing. Spoilers and all.

So when the sound of the TARDIS filled the dorm room, a sound Jenny loved hearing even though she hadn't seen her parents properly in a couple months, it made the two of them laugh a little louder.

"Wonder where they're taking you now?" Jenny asked as she put a pencil in the crease of her physics book to prevent the wind the TARDIS stirred up from making her lose her place.

"Maybe they're here for you." Melody countered.

"This early?" Jenny asked.

"Maybe," Melody shrugged, laying her arms over the pages of her own text book before watching the TARDIS materialize between their beds.

Her Dad's head popped out, and he grinned wide as he saw her. "Told you I'd get it right." He said as he opened the doors and stepped out, her Mum right behind her. "Hello, Love." He said to Jenny as he opened his arms. It didn't take her a second to get on her feet and rush toward her Dad.

"Missed you," She said as she squeezed him, especially since she knew that this was the youngest she'd seen him since they dropped her off.

"I missed you too," He said warmly, finally letting go.

"Hi, Mum." Jenny said when she met her Mum's eye, smiling at the watery grin she was given.

Rose opened her arms. "Hi sweetheart," She greeted, hugging her tightly.

"Would you like a hug too, River?" She heard her Dad say, and both girls startled at the offer.

"Sh-sh-sure," Melody stuttered as she got to her feet, moving slowly into the Doctor's embrace.

"Where's Aunt Donna and Tim?" Jenny asked as she stepped back from her mum, looking around her Dad at the TARDIS.

"They're inside waiting. This is just a pick up, after all."

"Oh?" Jenny asked giddily. "Where are we going?" She asked, looking between her parents.

"Well, first stop will be Earth to make another couple stops then, well, we don't know." Her Dad said, smiling at her Mum in a warm, loving way that seemed somehow more than she was used to.

"What's going on?" Jenny asked nervously.

"We're getting married." Her Mum replied, and Jenny couldn't stop the squeal that erupted before she threw her arms back around her mother as she hopped about, then moved on to her father with the same over excitement.

"Would you like to come too, River?" Her mum asked as she moved over to Melody, wrapping her arms around her in a partial hug.

"Oh, I'd love to, but I can't." She declined, looking between Rose and the Doctor with true regret. "I've seen the pictures, I know I'm not there." She added when the couple exchanged baffled looks.

"Spoilers, then?" The Doctor said in a teasing tone.

"Spoilers." Melody smirked with a wink.

The Doctor chuckled, squeezing Jenny a little closer to his side. "Best be off then. Already put this off long enough, or so I'm told."

"Oi, don't start. 'S our wedding day." Rose pointed firmly at the Doctor before he turned Jenny and lead her inside the TARDIS.

With one last look over her shoulder, she smiled and waved to Melody, catching the sad look she gave them before she masked it.

She must have been sad to not be able to go to such an important day for people so very important to her, it was the only reason Jenny could think of as to why Melody would be so sad to see them go on such a happy occasion.

* * *

 

"Please!" Tim pleaded as the Doctor and Rose flew them to some place called Cardiff. He was getting really into it to, with big eyes and hands clasped in front of his chin. He even bent his knees a bit and groveled to the Doctor as much as he could manage without getting down on the grating by the creepy-ass hand. It was glowing more than he'd like to admit, and the thing made his thought things flare when ever he looked at it.

"Why?" The Doctor asked, sounding exasperated but there was a glint of humor in his eye.

"Because it would be hysterical." Tim replied, standing a little straighter.

The Doctor narrowed his eyes at him. "Not sure you could pull it off."

"Oh I think I could." Tim took up the challenge.

The TARDIS landed with a gentle shudder. He could sense the ship's discomfort, but he also sensed that the sentient machine also had a sense of humor. And she found the idea brilliant.

"Alright." The Doctor said, glancing at the monitor, "but he's already coming up so you better catch him before he comes in." The Doctor said, and while it was quite the cryptic sentence, Tim flew across the room, down the ramp and to the doors. "Just outside now, Tim." The Doctor said.

Tim took a deep breath, opened the doors, and smiled at the man he felt he knew though had never met. "Jack!" He cried out in an impeccable English accent, if he did say so himself. "Good to see you, mate. Been a while, hasn't it?"

"Doctor?" The American (and that was a surprise, Rose never mentioned that bit before) asked as he looked Tim over. Perhaps a little too thoroughly, but if he was being honest he didn't really mind.

"Rose didn't tell you I regenerated, did she?" He said, already feeling himself crack. Captain Jack Harkness shook his head, crossing his arms. "It was terrible, really. Shagged to death, I was."

"Really, that's the best excuse you could come up with?" The real Doctor said as he came up behind Tim and opened the door a little wider. "Come on in, Jack." The Doctor said with a tilt of his head, and Tim stepped aside, laughing the entire time.

He watched as Jack glanced around the room, spotting Rose and darting for her. "Rosie!" He called out, squeezing her as he lifted her off the ground and spun her around, setting her down on her feet.

"Rosie? No man, Wolf Girl." Tim countered, and now that he was speaking in his own accent Jack looked over with surprise.

"You're traveling with someone who isn't British. That's different." Jack noted before he looked around the room. He smiled in a way that should have been really skeevy but somehow came off as charming. "And with so many beautiful people." He said, moving to Donna first and taking her hand. "How you doin', Ginger?" He asked her with a wink before kissing her knuckles.

"Better for meeting you," Donna flirted back, and wasn't she just so damn adorable when she was all smitten and blushing.

Jack then turned to Jenny. "Captain Jack Harkness." He said as he took Jenny's hand as well.

"Oh, I know all about you Uncle Jack." Jenny replied, catching the guy completely and totally off guard as he had his hand half way to his lips. "Mum and Dad have told me stories."

Jack seemed to loose all the color in his face as he stared really, really hard at Jenny with his mouth hanging open. He then turned to Rose. "How old are you?" He asked immediately.

"No older than the last time you spoke to me, assuming the last call you got was …."

"Namtier?" Jack asked, and Rose nodded. He whipped around and looked at the Doctor. "I thought Rose couldn't have children. And, and even if she did," he gestured at Jenny, "how?"

"Biologically mine," The Doctor saved the poor guy from an aneurysm. "Possibly a bit of Rose too. Likely a bit of Rose. A lot of Rose. Anyway, she's our daughter, Jenny. Genetic anomaly, long story, not why we're here."

Jack turned back to Rose. "I ask what's new, and never once do you think to say 'oh, the Doctor and I procreated via machine and now we have a full grown daughter?"

Wolf Girl smiled wickedly. "Much more fun for you to find out this way." She said, crossing her arms over her chest as she smiled with her tongue between her teeth.

"I'm going to get you for this," Jack warned with a grin, letting go of Jenny's hand to take a couple steps toward Wolf Girl. She chuckled. "So is that the reason for the visit, wanted me to meet the newest family member?"

"Actually," Rose said, twisting her fingers nervously. "Thought you'd like to be my man of honor."

"Man of Hon…?" Jack stopped. "Wait, does that mean? Are you two?" He asked, and Rose nodded. Jack cheered, first squeezing Wolf Girl extra tight, and then dashing over to the Doctor to do the same. "Alright, okay, I'm in. Just let me go get something decent to put on, grab the wedding gift I've had stashed away for this very special occasion, and then we're off to where ever is next." He said, darting past Tim then pausing. "And then maybe after it's done you, me, and ginger can get a little more acquainted." He asked with a leering grin that once again flattered Tim more than he thought it should before Jack darted out the doors that shut behind him.

It was only after he caught Donna's eye that he realized the full implication of what the Captain was offering before he shuddered in time with Time Lady.

"So where we going after Uncle Jack comes back?" Jenny said, plopping back down on the jumpseat, looking at her Dad as he was closest.

"We're going to pick up another old friend of me and your Mum, one Sarah Jane Smith, and then we'll find the best setting for us to do our bonding ceremony.

The TARDIS seemed suddenly startled before the ship shook about, a loud noise coming from outside like there was suddenly an Earth Quake. The four of those standing around the console room had to grab on to something, while Jenny held on to the seat as she was nearly tossed off.

"What the hell was that?!" Donna asked when the ship finally settled.

"That came from outside." The Doctor stated, looking more than a little worried before dashing for the doors. He opened them just enough to look out, becoming statue still as Wolf Girl went to stand beside him.

"Oh my god." She gasped. Tim looked to Donna, the closest one in the room to them, and she headed over to the couple while he followed more slowly, meeting Jenny in the middle as she joined him at looking over the shoulders of the older adults.

"Wait," Tim said as he realized what he was looking at. "Are we?"

"We're in space?" Donna said, sounding stunned and maybe a little frightened.

The Doctor dashed back to the monitor, and Rose closed the door before following him.

"We haven't moved." The Doctor said to her, gesturing to the monitor. It was never reassuring to hear his voice break the way it did when he broke the news. "The TARDIS is still in the same place, but the Earth is gone."

Gone. An entire planet. It was near impossible for Tim to fathom, yet ….

His though things flared. Earth, twenty-seven, Donna, Doctor, a decaying face.

They repeated, and he didn't want anyone in the room to know how much they made his stomach churn, not exactly helped when he remembered his aunt was now alone.

"How?" Rose asked. "How is it just gone?"

"I don't know." He said, too quiet.

"But if the Earth's gone, they've lost the sun." Donna said as she moved to join them. "What about my Mum? And Grandad? They're dead, aren't they?"

"I don't know, Donna." The Doctor said, pushing a hand through his hair. I just don't know, I'm sorry."

"So everyone we know, everyone we care about?" Tim said, swallowing back the lump of feeling sick in his throat. "I know that's not a lot of people, but …."

"We'll figure something out." Rose reassured, Jenny moving slowly to stand beside him. She held his hand loosely in her own in an attempt to comfort, offering him a weak smile.

"There's no readings." The Doctor shook his head. "Nothing, not a trace, not even a whisper. It's fearsome technology." He said, standing up right and turning to Wolf Girl. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry, but we're going to have to put off the bonding."

"You think I'm worried about that right now?" Rose asked, a disbelieving smile on her face.

"Well," The Doctor said, his head moving to side to side. "You did get all dressed up for the occasion. Don't think I didn't notice that." He said as he stroked her cheek as he brushed back her hair.

Tim wasn't sure how that was the case. Rose changed into a long, red sweater, or maybe it was a dress. She had on those legging things with her boots that she seemed to be taking a liking to lately, and had put on gold earrings and a necklace. He'd have thought they were just going out to have drinks, not get hitched by that outfit. He was pretty sure women usually wore white, but he didn't say anything.

"Outfit's not going anywhere." Rose shrugged. "But the Earth did. So let's find it, yeah?"

"Yeah," The Doctor nodded before stepping away and doing a little dance around the console before sending the TARDIS off to where ever.

"Where's we going?" Donna asked, sounding near panicked.

"To get help." The Doctor said, looking up and meeting her eye. "We're going to the Shadow Proclamation."

* * *

 

Jack ran back into the hub with a skip in his step, humming the classic wedding march as he went.

He passed Ianto who did a double take. "I thought you had a visitor?" He asked.

Jack paused smiling wide. "I do." He replied.

"Then why are you back inside? Alone?" Ianto replied, and Jack caught the way he peeked around to see if Rose was hiding by the door.

"Because I'm being picked up. Heading to a wedding I've been waiting centuries for, and I already had the gift waiting in my office." Jack replied.

But he didn't make it to his office, didn't even make it another step before the entire hub shook as if an earth quake hit South Wales.

* * *

 

It was like being punched in the gut while simultaneously being ripped apart. Mickey had described what using the canon felt like numerous times for numerous reasons, but the knowledge didn't prepare Jackie for what the sensation.

"You alright?" She felt Mickey's steady, stable hands on her shoulders, keeping her still. It took a moment for her head to settle, for her to feel more stable on her feet, and when the world stopped swaying she nodded. Mickey let go, nodding once before looking around.

She almost made the mistake of asking if they'd manage to arrive at night, but she looked up. "Too late." She said as she peered up at the starless sky. Though she had to admit the planets were something new and unexpected.

"No, we just need to find the Doctor. We're on Earth, proper Earth, he'll have to come because, well…."

"And how are we gonna do this, huh?" She asked Mickey, her voice going high and shrill in an effort not to sound so afraid. "Roam the streets of London til we find him?" Mickey looked up and around, and Jackie did the same. They were standing in front of a large water tower, a pier not all that far away. "Are we even in London?"

"Cardiff." Mickey said in way of explanation.

"How the hell are you standing on my front step?" Jackie whirled around, gun ready even though Mickey rolled his eyes.

"Your front step? Torchwood these days, are you?" Mickey replied, and Jackie just kept looking between the two men. One pretty darn handsome if she did say so herself, and she certainly didn't mean Mickey.

"Guess they're just letting anyone carry a badge in the other universe, eh Mickey Mouse?"

"Better than the lot they have here, Captain Cheesecake."

There was a pause before Mickey and the man cracked their serious facades and smiled, throwing their arms around one another in a not so manly hug.

Maybe she was wrong all that time, telling Jake to move on.

"Good to see you." Mickey mumbled.

"And you, Beefcake." The American said, his hand on Mickey's back drifting lower.

"And that's enough hugging." Mickey pulled back immediately.

Alright, not so wrong after all.

The American turned to Jackie, all smiles and charms. "Hello, Captain Jack Harkness." He offered his hand.

Jackie glanced at. "Married. And it's the end of the bloody world, mate, where do you get off hittin' on people when they Universe is in danger?" She challenged the very attractive man as he put his hands on his hips, smile not faltering a bit.

"You must by Rose's mum." He said, surprising her enough that she didn't have time to react before he pulled her close in a bone crushing hug. He smelled good, at least. "I've been wanting to meet you for a long time."

"You know my daughter?" She asked.

"Very well."

"You know where she is?"

"Rose, the Doctor, and their entourage were on the TARDIS before we all seemed to have moved, parked right over there on the rift." He pointed behind them. "Earth moved and they were gone. No idea if they dematerialized, or if the TARDIS being trans-dimensional made it unable to come along for the ride."

"So we did lock on to it's last location." Mickey nodded, looking to her. "But now what?"

"There's a family in Chiswick, Donna Noble's. If anyone's going to come in contact with the Doctor and Rose besides me, it's likely them. Do those things hop through more than dimensions?" He asked, gesturing to the wrist strap on Jackie's wrist. She turned to Mickey.

"Can do, yeah." He replied.

Jack gave the coordinates, and then helped Jackie put in hers as she didn't really know what she was doing. He kept eyeing her as he typed, smiling ever so slightly.

"What you staring at?" She asked eventually.

Jack laughed in his chest. "Not a thing, ma'am." He said, kissing her knuckles before letting go of her hand. "I'd come with you, but I should stay with my team, see what I can find out."

"We'll be seeing you later." Mickey promised, pushing the button on his vortex manipulator.

Jackie took one last look at the Captain. "Has she been safe?" She asked him.

His smile grew, "Beyond." He said simply, truthfully, and Jackie was satisfied enough with that to put off finding her daughter just a little bit longer.

* * *

 

"Have you heard from the Doctor?"

The question posed from Martha Jones was entirely innocent. Smart, too, considering the circumstances. After seeing Mickey and Rose's Mum a half hour ago, Jack had been trying to get a hold of the bride and her future husband but hadn't had any luck. The phone wouldn't even ring.

But it was one thing to tell the pair who somehow managed to cross dimensions to find them that he'd seen them recently, it was another to tell a former companion. A former companion, and mutual friend, who had recently lost the man she loved because she told the truth of how she got her position at unit. How she knew Jack himself, how she knew more about aliens than her former fiancee dared to imagine.

He felt Ianto and Gwen's eyes on him as if they heard the question that had been posed. Maybe they had, the hub was unusually quiet.

"Not a word," He lied, hating it instantly but knowing it was likely for the best.

Because how could he explain that they had been right there then disappeared when the world needed them?

* * *

 

She looked around the console room. At Jenny and Tim standing solemnly off to the side, both looking very unsure what to do as they gripped the rail behind them. At the Doctor focusing with intense concentration on the monitor while his knuckles turned white as he clenched his fingers on the console. At Rose standing next to him looking nervous.

How the day turned to topsy turvy, Donna would never understand. Two hours ago she stood in the Doctor and Rose's bedroom as Rose selected what she wanted to wear for the bonding thingy. Wedding, for all intents and purposes. A red sweater dress, because that was the color most associate with the Doctor, with his planet, his people. A sweet sentiment, really, especially when Rose made sure to only wear gold jewelry aside from her ring.

She had changed into the suit she hadn't worn for a while, probably not since they found Tim.

And him, even he had put in the effort by wearing an oxford under his leather jacket.

An hour ago they retrieved Jenny from school. Jenny, who eagerly asked her mother and Aunt Donna what she should choose to wear, picking out one of her mothers old skirts and blouses.

Moments ago they'd gone to get Jack Harkness, who had ran inside to grab something to celebrate the occasion.

Now they were on their way to … well, Donna didn't really get where.

"What is the Shadow Proclamation, again?" She asked the Doctor before the TARDIS gave a particularly violent shake.

"Posh name for police. Outer space police." He replied, and the TARDIS stilled. "Now, here we are. When we step out, hands in the air, let me do all the talking." He instructed, and he and Rose took the lead to the TARDIS doors.

Donna followed, glancing over her shoulder to see what was essentially two nervous kids coming up behind her, hand in hand. Likely would stay that way until they had to put their hands up.

And it was instant, the way they needed to do such a gesture, as five giant Rhino things stood before them, guns all aimed at one of the five of them.

It spoke, though the TARDIS didn't translate it, and the Doctor replied, using the same, single syllable sounds as the aliens had. The guns were lowered, the Doctor made two more sounds, and they were being led away.

Everything felt, well, alien. There was weird lighting, like gray-blue. Everything around them was very clinical, and the person they were led to … she was an interesting sight. Albino? But alien Albino. Donna would guess, anyway. She'd had enough encounters with aliens to know so many of them looked human. She was standing next to one as it was, and his half alien daughter was half-hiding behind her.

The Rhinos and the Albino exchanged a few words that made no sense, and the woman seemed very intrigued. Likely a good sign.

"Time Lords are the stuff of legend." She said to the Doctor without so much as a 'How do you do?'. "They belong in the myths and whispers of the Higher Species. You cannot possibly exist."

Obviously he can, Dumbo, as he's standing right there! Donna yelled it in her mind but kept her mouth shut.

"Are you always this rude with those who come to you for help?" Rose asked, looking as much like she can't believe this woman's audacity as Donna could. Go Blondie.

"And exactly who are you to question my manners?"

"A human," Rose half shrugged. "Sorta. Little different, I suppose. More likely to not exist than a Time Lord, but that's neither here nor there. You're being rude to my mate, 's not something I take lightly."

The woman looked long and hard at Rose as if she could learn everything she could just by looking. Then again, alien, probably could.

"You and your mate are quite the unique pair. How fascinating the two of you are." She remarked, maintaining her poised posture and air of authority through her curiosity.

"Yeah, we could discuss species and uniqueness all day, but I've got a missing planet." The Doctor disrupted, putting his hands in his pockets and rocking on the balls of his feet.

"Then you're not as wise as the stories would say." The Woman replied, earning an eyebrow raise from the Doctor. "The picture is far bigger than you imagine. The whole Universe is in outrage, Doctor." And how did she know that name? He must have said it to the Rhino things. "Twenty-four planets have disappeared."

"How many?" He asked, voice loud and cracking. "Which ones, show us." He demanded, moving to a computer with the Albino woman and Rose. Donna looked over her shoulder to make sure Jenny and Tim were alright, and they did look a little more settled than they had when they all first landed. The three of them moved to join the couple as they looked over the list.

"Locations range far and wide," the Albino explained. "But all disappeared at the exact same moment, leaving no trace."

"Callufrax Minorr, Jahoo, Shallacatop."

"Solodaris 3." Rose said, pointing at the list. "You didn't forget where it was. Wasn't there. And look, Woman Wept."

"Woman Wept?" The Doctor put his hands in his hair. "We were just there. Just there no more than, what? A day or two ago?"

"Oh my god," Jenny said, letting go of Tim and moving to stand between her parents. "The dead planet of Montebello, M … River was going there. With a few of the other students, an expedition. She might be out there."

"Maybe," The Doctor huffed. "Clom! Clom's gone? Who'd want Clom?"

"Who'd want a couple of dead planets? Some caught in frozen states, or unlivable most of the year?" Rose countered.

"Some of those that were taken were populated, but some not." The Albino said. "All different sizes, all unconnected."

Twenty four missing planets. In all the universe it was probably a very small amount. Had to be thousands of planets out there. But then, Donna remembered her early travels when it had only been the three of them.

"What about Pyrovillia?" She asked the Doctor, though apparently it wasn't taken in such a way.

"Who is this female?" The Albino asked in a condescending way.

"Donna. One hundred percent human, no enhancements or alien mates, but every bit as important as Time Lords and the lot, thank you."

"Well spoken, M.I.W." Tim clapped her own the back as Donna caught the proud, approving grin that the Doctor gave her before he covered it with a cough.

"Pyrovillia?" Rose asked.

"Way back when we were in Pompeii, Lucius said it had gone, remember?" She asked and Rose nodded slowly.

"Pyrovillia is cold case. Not relevant!" The Rhino thing that remained in the room said, startling Donna with its loud, booming voice as it spoke her language.

"How d'you mean, cold case?" She asked, looking between it and the Albino.

"The planet Pyrovillia disappeared over 2000 years ago." She replied.

"Yes, yes, but, hang on. There's the Adipose breeding planet, too. Miss Foster said that was lost, but that must've been a long time ago."

"That's it, Donna! Brilliant!" The Doctor shout, looking at her with a half-mad grin. "Planets are being taken out of time as well as space."

"So there are more?" Rose asked nervously.

"Oh yes," the Doctor said, tapping a few things on the computer panel and suddenly there was a hologram of twenty four planets in the room. "Now, if we add Pyrovillia, and Adipose 3, something missing." He mused, looking to Rose. "Where else?"

She furrowed her brow. "There was that moon." She noted.

"Oh! The lost moon of Poosh!" He said, adding the planet to their list.

The hologram shifted and changed, rearranging the planets in an elegant looking rotation. All that was missing was a sun in the middle, and it would be a perfect solar system.

"What did you do?" Albino asked.

"Nothing," The Doctor said in awe. "The planets rearranged themselves into the optimum pattern."

"There's a such thing?" Rose asked, looking just as amazed as he was.

"'Course there is. Doesn't always happen in a solar system because it can't truly control what planets are in its orbit. But when you get things just right …."

"Oi, don't get all spaceman," Donna snapped, crossing her arms. "What happens when things are just right?"

"All those worlds fit together like pieces of an engine," He explained. "It's like a powerhouse. But what for?" He said, his brow furrowing as he started to think it over.

"Who could design such a thing?" The Albino asked.

"You might be surprised," Rose sighed. "Lots of beings do lots of strange, sinister things in weird ways."

"You four should settle for a bit." The Doctor said without looking up at anyone. "Might be a bit."

"We will have seating brought in for your …?" The Albino asked.

"Daughter, companions, mate." The Doctor said absently, gesturing to the appropriate people without having to look where they were.

"Daughter?" Albino said.

Jenny stepped back slightly behind Tim. "Not that interesting, really." She said.

"No," Albino seemed disappointed as a few people brought in chairs. "Suppose not."

"If you think I'm going to just sit this out." Rose warned the Doctor.

"Rose, I know you've seen the Universe, and you know so, so much. But right now this," He pointed to hologram. "This is something way beyond anything you've ever seen, ever even imagined possible. Someone tried to steal the Earth a long time ago and this is eerily similar. I just … I need to think." He said, grasping her hand and making her gasp.

"Alright." She said after a moment, nodding once before going over to Jenny and sitting with her arm around her.

Tim sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. Once mother and daughter were settled a ways away chatting about what happened since they last spoke, Donna went to speak to him. "You alright, Psychboy?" She asked soothingly, rubbing his back.

"So much is happening." He said quietly. "And I've had the same thing in my head on repeat since we noticed Earth was gone. My stomach's in knots, but …." He sighed again.

"Take this," Another Albino came up to them, a gentle smile on her face as she offered Tim a small, orange capsule in one hand, balancing a tray of four water glasses in the other. "You'll need to do it with water, but it will calm your visions, clear your mind, lower the pain."

Tim, brave man that he was, reached and plucked up the alien capsule without question, popping it in his mouth and swallowing back an entire cup of water.

"You should take the water as well, it purifies." She said to Donna as Tim caught his breath.

"Thanks." Donna said as she took the cup.

"You are something new," New Albino said, tilting her head slightly.

"Not me, I'm just a temp." Donna smiled slightly, lifting her shoulders and shaking her head. "Shorthand, filing, 100 words per minute. Fat lot of good that is now. I'm no use to anyone."

"You'll be surprised." Tim said, the pain having left his voice though his eyes were still closed and his head was still tilted back.

New Albino smiled at him. "He sees the truth of what's to come." Her smile faltered. "But not all. He doesn't see."

"Maybe I do." He said softly.

New Albino nodded, turning back to Donna. "I'm sorry for your loss." She said kindly, placing her free hand on Donna's forearm.

"Not just my loss," Donna replied kindly. "He's from Earth, too."

"No, I mean your loss that is yet to come." She said, bowing her head and darting over to mother and daughter.

"What does she mean, my loss yet to come?" Donna asked Tim, trying not to sound desperate.

"Can't tell you, Time Lady." He said simply.

"Fat lot a good you are, psychboy." She teased, and he snorted.

"How about I give you lottery numbers for next week to make up for it." He smirked, lifting his head and looking at her.

"You can do that?" She asked, and he arched a brow. "Oi, don't go making claims like." She smiled as he laughed.

"Donna, Tim, I need you two to think." The Doctor darted over, breaking their moment. "Earth, must've been some sort of warning. Was anything happening? Like electrical storms, freak weather, patterns in the sky?"

"Snow storm in October?" Tim offered. "But then again, considering where I lived."

"There were the bees." Donna said as she thought on it. The Doctor looked at her intensely. "Well, the bees. They were disappearing."

"The bees disappearing," The Doctor repeated, eyes darting around as he thought it over. "The bees disappearing!" He ran back to the computer, typing frantically.

"Dad, what is it?" Jenny asked as she and Rose got up to join him once more.

"The bees, Love. The bees are the key." He replied.

"I don't understand, how is that significant?" Albino asked.

"On Earth we have these insects that were vanishing. Some people said it was pollution, or mobile phone signals." She shrugged.

"Or they were going back home." The Doctor said, half triumphant.

"Back home?" Donna asked, confused.

"Planet Melissa Majoria," He added.

"Are you saying bees are aliens?" Donna asked in disbelief.

"Giant. Fracking. Wasp." Tim reminded, arms spread wide as if he could somehow convey the size. "If you have a hard time believing little bees could be alien after seeing that monstrosity."

"Oi, don't get lippy." Donna growled. Yeah, okay, that was alien, so bees could be, she supposed.

"Not all bees are alien," The Doctor said. "But if the migrant bees felt something coming, some sort of danger, and escaped … Tandocca!" H cried.

"The Tandocca Scale." Albino said, obviously understanding.

"What's that?" Rose asked.

"It's a serious of wavelengths used as a carrier signal by migrant bees Infinitely small, no wonder we didn't see it. Like looking for a speck of cinnamon in the Sahara. But look, there it is!" He said pointing out something on the computer. "The Tandocca trail. The transmat moved the planets using the same wavelength."

"Can we follow it?" Rose asked.

"Oh yes," The Doctor said, all manic excitement.

"Well then what are we waiting here for?" Donna asked, throwing her hands up. "Stop talking, and let's go find the Earth."

She lead the run back to the TARDIS until the Doctor passed her, and Rose caught up. He snapped his fingers, and the doors flew open.

"That's a neat trick," Jenny commented as they all rushed in.

"River didn't tell you that one?" The Doctor asked as he ran to the controls, not waiting for an answer from his daughter. Probably for the best as all Jenny did was shrug. "We're a bit late, the signal's scattered, but it's a start." He said, darting back outside. He came back a second later, making a show of locking the door before running to console. "Allons-y!" He said as he flipped the switch, sending them into the Vortex, hot on the trail of finding Earth.

* * *

 

Jackie and Mickey reappeared on a residential street looking at the back of a Dalek.

"HOSTILITY WILL NOT BE TOLERATED! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" It cried out, and they didn't think twice about lifting their guns and firing at the thing. The top half of the Dalek was blown off, leaving only flaming remains between them and an old man with a paint-ball gun.

He stared back at them, seemingly unsure of the situation. "D'you wanna swap?" He asked with half a smile as he gestured with his gun.

Jackie and Mickey walked around the Dalek remains. "You know Donna Noble?" Mickey asked.

"She's my granddaughter. But she's not here, she's off with the Doctor and that lovely Rose."

"Yeah, well, I'm Jackie Tyler, Rose's Mum. And I need to find out where the hell my daughter is."

Mickey rolled his eyes, but she chose to ignore it. Or at least he assumed. "I'm Mickey Smith, friend of the Doctor's. Let's go inside, we need your help."

"Yeah, and it's not safe out here." Jackie added for good measure.

"Wilfred Mott, and any friends or family of those two are more than welcome so long as I live here," He said, gesturing to the house behind him.

Mickey and Jackie followed, pleased to be inside where there was some form of proper light.

"You keep in touch with Donna since she left?" Mickey asked as Wilf offered for them to take the sofa.

"Yeah, I've tried calling her, but I can't get through. But last I checked, she was still with 'em. She phoned from some planet called Namteir. Thought she was a Queen, or something foolish.

"What the hell are you on about?" A woman entered the room, not seeming to find it odd at all that there were strange people in the living room. At least until she caught Mickey's eye. "Oh where'd Donna find you, Sweetheart? Little young to be going around with someone like her." She said with a smile.

"Donna didn't find him, he's trying to find her. They both are. 'Cause she's out there, Sweetheart. Your daughter's traveling the stars, with that Doctor and Rose. She always has been.

"Don't be ridiculous." The woman scoffed.

"Hey," Jackie got up, and while it crossed his mind to stop her, Mickey decided not to. "Now you listen to me. I know it's easier to pretend the whole thing isn't real with others. Better to say your daughter's off in France, traveling to Ireland. But I've been in your shoes, mate, and let me tell you when the weird alien stuff starts happening you gotta stop lying to yourself about. 'Cause suddenly your daughter brings home some strange bloke who claims he's the Doctor while there are some freaky aliens in the skies. And if you can't do it for your own sake, do it for your daughters."

"And where do you come off giving me a lecture in my own home?" The woman challenged.

"What are you, fifty something? Yeah well, may be younger than you, but I got load more experience."

"Jackie," Mickey got her attention. "We need to refocus on finding Rose and the Doctor."

There's a lull where the woman, Donna's mum, slowly slunk down to sit next to Wilf. Jackie kept meeting Mickey's eye, looking more and more lost with each glance.

"Can anyone hear me?" A familiar voice called out from an open laptop on a small desk in the corner of the living room. Everyone in the room looked over.

"Is that?" Mickey asked, getting up and darting over to the computer.

"The Subwave Network is open. You should be able to hear my voice. Is there anyone there? This message is of the utmost importance. We haven't much time. Can anyone hear me?"

Mickey tried typing.

"Harriet Jones, where the bloody hell are you?" He asked, trying to make sense of the incoming communication.

"Captain Jack Harkness, shame on you! Now stand to attention, sir!" Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister ordered as her image came through on the screen.

"She can't hear or see us, can she?" Mickey asked over his shoulder. "Don't see a webcam built in."

Wilf gestured to Donna's Mum. "She said they're naughty." He said, earning a slap from her.

"Now, let's see if we can talk to each other." Harriet said, and the sound of tapping keys came through. The screen suddenly divided into four, revealing Sarah Jane, Jack, appearing along side Harriet. "The fourth contact seems to be having trouble getting through. I'll just boost the signal."

Another woman appeared, one Mickey hadn't met.

One he really wouldn't mind an introduction to.

"Hello?" She said, and Jack started laughing.

"Martha Jones! Where the hell are ya?"

"I guess project Indigo was more clever than we thought. One second I was in Manhattan, the next second … maybe Indigo tapped into my mind. 'Cause I ended up in the one place that I wanted to be: home." She said as an older woman, likely her mum, came up behind her.

"Good to know their project Indigo worked that well." Mickey grumbled. "Probably woulda found Rose and the Doctor that much sooner."

"Oh, stop your belly-aching. Theirs doesn't go between Universes." Jackie reminded him with a smack on the arm.

"This, ladies and gentlemen, this is the Subwave Network. A sentient piece of software, programmed to see out anyone and everyone who can help to contact the Doctor. His secret army." Harriet explained as Mickey started paying attention again.

"What if the Daleks hear us?" The super smart, and really pretty Martha Jones asked Harriet.

"No, that's the beauty of the Subwave: it's undetectable."

"And you invented it?" Sarah Jane asked with very carefully concealed disbelief.

"I developed it. It was created by the Mister Copper Foundation." Harriet replied, no seeming offended in the least.

"Yeah, but what we need right now is a weapon." Jack cut to the chase. "Martha, back there at UNIT, what did they give you? What was that key thing?"

"The Osterhagen Key." She replied evenly, showing the black, memory card like thing around her neck.

"That key is not to be used, Doctor Jones. Do not under any circumstances." Harriet warned.

"She's awfully young and pretty to be a Doctor." Mickey commented, earning another smack on the back of the head from Jackie.

"Forget about the key," Harriet had to what ever the Captain had to offer. "All we need it the Doctor."

"Oh, excuse me, Harriet. But, well, the thing is, if you're looking for the Doctor … didn't he depose you?" Sarah Jane asked like the journalist she is.

"He did." Harriet replied. "And I've wondered about that for a long time. Whether I was wrong, I stand by my actions to this day." Mickey snorted. "Because I knew that one day the Earth would be in danger and the Doctor would fail to appear. I told him so myself and he didn't listen."

"Yeah, that's the thing: He was here." Jack said, rubbing the back of his neck. "I'm sorry, Martha, I lied before. But when someone tries to say the Doctor failed to show up, even if it is someone I respect."

"Jack, what do you mean?" Harriet asked.

"I spoke to the Doctor and Rose, stood right inside the TARDIS just a minute before all this happened."

"Oh God, Mickey, she's with him! She's still with him." Jackie grabbed on to him, though he wasn't so sure he understood the excitement. They already knew they were still together, though he supposed it was the idea of how soon to events she was last seen.

"So where is now?" Harriet asked.

"That's the thing, I don't think the TARDIS would have been pulled along for the ride. It would have only latched on to Earth-based technology. When the Earth moved, they stayed. Any attempts at trying to contact him or Rose have failed. It's like … well, as impossible as it is, it's like they're out of range." He seemed to have an idea. "But if we boost the signal, we transmit Rose's telephone number through Torchwood itself, using all the power of the Rift …."

"And we've got Mister Smith," A young, teenage boy with Sarah Jane suggested. "He can link up with every telephone exchange on the Earth. He can get the whole world to call the same number, all at the same time! Billions of phones, calling out all at once."

"Haha! Brilliant! Who's the kid?" Jack asked.

"My son," Sarah Jane said proudly.

Jack chuckled in his chest, "Oh you and the Doctor really need to do some catching up." He said just before a well dressed man pushed past him, looking at the monitor with the utmost seriousness.

"Excuse me, sorry. Hello, Ianto Jones." The Welshman introduced himself. "Um, if we star transmitting, then this Subwav Network is going to become visible. I mean, to the Daleks."

"Yes, and they'll trace it back to me." Harriet said, expanding her chest. "But my life doesn't matter. Not if it saves the Earth."

"Ma'am," Jack saluted.

"Thank you, Captain. Now, enough of words. Let's begin!"

* * *

 

"It's stopped." The Doctor said as the time rotor no longer moved. Rose looked up, looked at her daughter and Tim, then to Donna. She smiled thinly, but she knew why they stopped without landing. She'd seen on the monitor just before the Doctor said as much.

"What d'you mean? Is that good or bad? Where are we?" Donna asked, panic in her voice, making her seem gruffer than normal.

"The Medusa Cascade." The Doctor said, moving away from the console and opening up both doors of the TARDIS for the others to see. It was beautiful, positively beautiful, and Jenny drifted to the sight first. She stood by her father, and he dropped his arm around her shoulders. "I came here when I was just a kid. 90 years old. It was the center of a rift in time and space …."

"It's stunning," Jenny said, Tim coming up beside him.

"Is this safe?" He asked.

"TARDIS shield will keep the air in, just don't go out for a space walk." He said, trying to sound up beat and failing terribly.

"Where are the 27 planets?" Donna asked, and Rose had to hand it to her: she knew how to stay on topic.

"Nowhere." The Doctor said darkly. "The Tandocca Trail stops dead." He pecked Jenny on the head before turning back and heading up the ramp. "End of the line."

He reached out to her, and Rose took his hand and pulled him toward her. Wrapping his arms around her, she didn't need a bond to feel his utter devastation, his frustration, the helplessness making home in his hearts. This was supposed to be a good day, a brilliant day, for both of them. And now they were chasing her home planet and failing miserably at finding it.

Donna came up to them. "Oh no, no you two don't get to give up." She said quietly and desperately, glancing over at the doors where Jenny and Tim still stood. "You never give up, don't start now. Not with my family, with Tim's aunt. All the others out there counting on you. Don't give up."

"Donna," The Doctor said quietly, apologies ready to come out.

But Rose's cell phone stopped them.

She looked over on the console where she'd left it, seeing the screen filled with far to many number to simply be a phone number. She answered it anyway. She didn't need to say anything to know she wasn't going to get a traditional reply. "It's noise." She said, handing it to the Doctor.

He listened, eyes going wide, "It's a signal!" He said excitedly.

"Can we follow it?" Donna asked, hoping coming back.

"Oh just watch me," The Doctor said as she started hooking Rose's phone into the coordinates. "Jenny, Tim, close the doors," He shouted, and Rose glanced to see the two working as one to do that. "Locking on," He said. "Everyone grab something." He instructed before reaching over and pulling the lever.

The TARDIS glow changed from blue to red, and the Old Girl's hum sounded pained.

"Dad, what's happening?" Jenny asked.

"We're traveling through time. Once second into the future, and the phone call's pulling us through." He explained as the console sparked. He ducked, avoiding it, rubbing the rotor in apology.

"Three, two, one." He said, and the TARDIS finally stopped her complaining. As Rose moved to stand beside the Doctor, Jenny darted down the ramp to peek outside.

"Wow," She said in awe.

"Holy crap, there they are." Tim said, peeking over Jenny's shoulders. "All 27, Earth included."

"And we're still in the Medusa Cascade." Jenny noted, looking over Tim's arm at them. "We haven't physically moved."

"Why couldn't we see them before?" Donna asked, standing on the other side of the Doctor.

He grinned at her. "The entire Medusa Cascade has been put a second out of sync with the rest of the Universe. Perfect hiding place, tiny little pocket of time. But we found them." He said, grin stretching wider with every word.

"The signal?" Rose asked, looking at her phone.

"Some sort of Subwave Network." He replied as the monitor flickered.

Rose looked, watching as familiar faces filled the screen.

She laughed, covering her mouth as tears sprang to her eyes.

"I know it really wasn't all that long ago, but it's so good to see you." She said to Jack.

"Just glad we found you again."

"Rose, is that your Doctor?" Gwen asked her. "He's a bit nice, I though he'd be older."

"He's not that young," Ianto reminded her.

"Time and a place, you two." Jack scolded.

"It's the Dalek's," Sarah Jane told them, a young boy hovering near her shoulder. "They are taking people to their spaceship."

"Blimey, this is like outer space Facebook." Donna mused with a grin. The screen blinked out, turning white. "We've lost them."

"How'd that happen so quickly?" Rose asked.

"Didn't lose them, just another signal coming through." He said thoughtfully, whacking the top of the monitor. "Hello? Can you hear us?"

"Your voice is different, and yet its arrogance is unchanged." An old, decrepit sounding voice filled the console room, causing the Doctor to stiffen. Rose grabbed his hand, squeezing it.

"No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no." He cried in his mind. "Not possible, not him."

A decayed looking humanoid appeared on the screen. It looked like he didn't have any eyes, but there was something in the middle of his forehead that reminded Rose of one.

"Welcome to my new Empire, Doctor." He taunted. "It is only fitting that you should bear witness to the resurrection, and the triumph, of Dravos: lord and creator of the Dalek race."

"Can't be. Not Possible. Time War. He couldn't have." The Doctor cried in his mind.

"Have you nothing to say?" Dravos challenged him.

"But you were destroyed." The Doctor managed a reply. "In the very first year of the Time War, at the Gate of Elysium. I saw your command ship fly into the jaws of the Nightmare Child. I tried to save you." The words came quick and sharp, his eyes darkening with each one.

"But it took one stronger than you. Dalek Caan himself." Dravos replied. "Emergency temporal shift took him back into the Time War itself."

"But that's impossible, the entire War is timelocked." The sputtered in disbelief, anger increasing.

"And yet he succeeded. Oh, it cost him his mind, but imagine a single, simple Dalek succeeded where Emperors and Time Lords have failed. A testament, don't you think, to my remarkable creations?"

"And you made a new race of Daleks." The Doctor spat.

"I have myself to them. Quite literally. Each one grown from a cell of my own body."

There was a lot Rose had seen and done, a lot of disturbing, disgusting images she created with her own hands. But when Dravos opened his shirt and showed how much of his own, rotting body was gone, Rose's stomach churned.

"New Daleks," Dravos went on. "True Daleks. I have my children, Doctor. What do you have now?"

Rose burned at that, prepared to give the thing a piece of her mind.

"Don't," The Doctor calmed her instantly. "After all this time," he said to Dravos. "Everything we saw, everything we lost, I have one thing to say to you." He planted a huge, cheerful smile on his face. "Bye," he said, dropping Rose's hand and pulling the lever.

"Where we going now?" Rose asked, voice shaking.

"Earth." He said in that same cheerful tone before his smile faded.

They landed with a shudder, the ride being short with the Earth so close, and the Doctor made to step out first.

As Rose and the rest followed outside, she couldn't help but shiver at the scene around them. A sky with no life in it but the other twenty six planets that shouldn't be. The street of what should be a busy suburb quiet, dotted with broken bikes and abandoned cars. There was rubbish everywhere, bags waiting on the curb for a pick that never came having broken open by one of many possible methods.

"Like a ghost town." Donna said.

"It's like the world under Saxon's reign." Tim more accurately noted.

"What?" Donna asked.

"You wouldn't remember." The Doctor said as he looked around. "Sarah Jane said they were taking people. But for what?"

"Maybe she knows?" Jenny said, and Rose looked at her Daughter, seeing her point up the road. She turned, squinting at the woman coming toward them. A very familiar looking woman with bottle blonde hair and a track suit.

Her heart caught in her throat.

"Mum?" She stuttered.

"Jackie?" The Doctor said, more confused than anything.

The woman stopped, stood perfectly still.

"Rose!" She called, and it was all it took to get Rose's feet moving. Slow at first, she found her speed picking up as she noticed her Mum, her Mum, who she thought she'd never see again running toward her.

It had to be a trap, a fake, not real.

She didn't care.

As they got closer she could see her Mom's tear stained face much more clearly, the smile spreading and the strap of a gun along her chest.

Her Mum. Back.

"EXTERMINATE!" The word caused Rose to freeze, her heart leaping as she watched her Mum's eyes widen in terror as she skidded to a stop and looked to the side.

Rose was just really, really thankful that the bolt of pain went through her just as her Mum shouted her name.


	31. Journey's End pt 1

When the alien thing came over the network, and all they could hear was the conversation between it and the Doctor, Jackie looked to Mickey.

"I'm going after her." She said bluntly.

"How?" Mickey asked. "You don't know how to work that thing."

"May not, but I can damn well try."

"Jackie." Mickey cautioned.

"No," Jackie said firmly. "The Doctor will come here, and when he does I'm gonna be there." She said, barely able to meet Mickey's eyes but forced herself too.

He looked betrayed, and she understood. Because he didn't get his proper goodbye either, not the second time around. He had told her as much one night at the mansion when he'd gotten back late from a mission, and Tony was squirming about inside her to the point that she couldn't sleep. Mickey had said how it bothered him that he couldn't tell Rose he would have been there for her if she'd stayed. That he knew she loved the Doctor but he …. And it was there still, with every frustrated return, with ever close call. He had seen her laying on a table, being examined and scanned, blood drawn and tissue samples taken while she, the Doctor, and two others were unconscious. He was pulled back when his vitals showed signs of him passing out, but that didn't stop him from ranting and raving before finally settling in time for their final jump.

"After all the work I did on the jumps." He said, shaking his head.

"I know, Micks, and I'm sorry. I really am. But she's my daughter, and I need to see her." Jackie said firmly. "Besides, you're a soldier. I can point a gun and shoot, but if any real danger comes up I'd be right useless. Least I'd be with the Doctor." She argued, and she could see Mickey couldn't argue back.

"Gimme your wrist." He said with a huff. He pushed a few buttons on her vortex manipulator. "It'll take you within range of the TARDIS, but not right there so you gotta be careful, got it?"

"Got it." She nodded, taking a deep breath, putting on a brave face. She stood, preparing to push the button. With one last look at Wilf and Donna Noble's mother, she held the eye of a woman she should have had much more comradery with. "One day she's gonna need to come back, and you're gonna have to understand that she's different. He makes them different, better, and you're just gonna have to suck it up and deal with it." And just as the disgruntled woman was about to give her unwanted input, Jackie hit the button and disappeared.

She reappeared on a street at the top of a hill, and while the gut punch feeling was quite a bit to come back from, seeing the TARDIS at the bottom of the hill made it worth it.

Even more so when she saw Rose stepping out behind the Doctor, three other people following.

But she didn't care about anyone else.

Not the ginger who was likely Donna.

Not the skinny boy.

Not the blonde girl pointing her out.

Only Rose.

It all became hazy. She ran, Rose ran. They were so close to each other, and getting closer. Jackie didn't give a flying anything that her mascara was likely running with the tears that spilled freely, she was about to hold her daughter again.

And then a single, robotic word from her nightmares stopped them both short, and Jackie Tyler watched her daughter, who she hadn't seen in three years, drop to the street dead.

Jack appeared in front of Rose, shooting the Dalek and allowing Jackie to go to her daughter's side. Her tears of joy were now weeps of heart break as she knelt beside Rose's body.

"Jackie, it's alright." The Doctor said, his voice shaking. "It's okay, I promise, but we need to get her inside the TARDIS."

"Has she ever been hit by a Dalek ray before?" Jack asked casually as the Doctor picked up Rose's body.

"No," The Doctor said bluntly, turning toward the time ship. The blonde girl snapped her fingers, and the doors opened for the Doctor. He carried her inside, and Jackie scrambled after him.

"What the bloody hell are you doing?" She demanded as she followed the Doctor inside, right up to his side as he lowered her daughter's body on the jumpseat. He sat down on the floor beside it, holding Rose's hand.

"It's not safe for us to wait out there." He said calmly enough. "And I don't know how long it's going to take."

"How long it's going to take for what?" Jackie asked.

Rose took a deep breath, and Jackie nearly died of a heart attack herself.

* * *

 

The pain was intense, the worse she'd had yet, and breathing had been easier in other situations. She felt the Doctor's relief and love pour over her, and it was enough for her to ease her eyes open to see him. "Bloody Dalek." She croaked out, sitting up slowly with help from him via hand on her back.

It made it so neither of them was prepared for the slap her mum dealt him. It was hard enough to jerk his head back, reminiscent if not worse than the first one she ever gave him.

"What in bloody hell have you done to my daughter?" She said, voice going louder with every word.

"Wait, you're my grandma?" Jenny said, and Jackie whipped around to look at her. Jenny smiled. "I do have your chin!" She added with glee, pointing between hers and Jackie's.

"What the bloody hell is going on here?" Jackie demanded, looking between Rose and the Doctor. "I leave you here three years ago, think I'm leaving my daughter in good hands, only to come back and find out that not only have you pulled some freaky alien thing on her to keep her around, but you knocked her up and somehow have a full grown child of your own. One of yous better start talking right now, or so help me the Daleks are gonna look like your best mates."

"I did it Mum, not the Doctor." Rose said, slowly getting to her feet. She took Jackie's hands. "I did something when I went back to save him that one time, remember? When he sent me away and I wouldn't have it? I did something, me. I did it, and it didn't, I dunno, activate until after you left. Hasn't been three years, Mum, it's been six."

Jackie gaped at her, hesitantly stroking Rose's cheek. "You're nearly thirty." Rose nodded. "You don't look like you aged a day."

"Probably didn't." Rose laughed quietly. "But it's more than that, Mum."

"And what about this daughter?" She said, gesturing to Jenny over Rose's shoulder.

Rose turned, opening an arm and gesturing for Jenny to come over as the Doctor stood up, straightening his jacket. When Jenny was firmly between them, they both had their arms around her. "She's ours, but I didn't give birth to her." She looked to Jenny. "This is your grandma, Jackie."

"Like my middle name?" She asked, and Rose nodded.

Jackie turned to the Doctor. "You named your daughter after me?" She asked.

"Well," he shrugged, "Technically, I suppose, you could say …." He was cut off by the firm kiss and tight hug Jackie gave him much to the amusement of everyone else in the room.

"Aww, look at you. Stormboy getting along with the sorta mother-in-law."

"Sorta!" Jackie pulled back.

"Let's not start." The Doctor groaned, and Jenny hugged her Dad in an effort to comfort him.

Everything went dark, the TARDIS's hum stopping nearly entirely until it sounded like nothing more than her taking a nap.

"What's happening?" Tim asked nervously.

The Doctor stepped out of Jenny's arms.

"They've got us." He said as he looked over the controls, likely for a sign of power. "Power's gone, some kind of chronon loop." He said just before the ship rocked about.

"There's a massive Dalek ship at the center of the planets." Jack said, sounding all the world a soldier. "They're calling it the Crucible. Guess that's out destination."

"You said the planets were like an engine," Donna reminded. "But what for?"

"Jackie," The Doctor returned to them, clutching Jackie's shoulders and looking her in the eye. "Your world is running ahead of this one. You've seen the future, what was it?"

Jackie shook her head, eyes wide with fear. "Nothing like this. Just the stars going out. One by one, up in the sky. Didn't think too much of it at first, thought it was just a strange thing, but suddenly the sky gets darker and darker. And Pete, he takes the whole safety of the Earth thing seriously he does. Starts looking into it and finds it's dangerous. Had no way of stopping it, so he and Mickey worked on the dimension canon and he started looking for you."

"Mickey?" Rose asked.

"He's back on Earth right now. Told him to go help. I'm right useless in a crisis, after all."

"So why are you here then?" The Doctor asked.

"Ya daft? Came back to see my daughter. And meet my granddaughter too, apparently." She sobered. "At least before we …." Jackie didn't finish the sentence. She really didn't have to. Everyone knew what being taken by the Daleks meant, even if they'd never encountered them before. There'd been stories, and so the seven people inside the TARDIS clung to each other in pairs and a group, and those who noticed it ignoring the steady glowing hand and the exhausted hum of the time ship.

* * *

 

Smiths need to stick together. Maybe it was those words spoken to him oh so very long ago that drew him to Sarah Jane, saving her from Daleks and staying with her as they found the TARDIS and then watched it being taken by four Daleks.

"That teleport thing, can we use it?" Sarah Jane asked him, pointing to the manipulator on his wrist. "If they've taken the Doctor to the Dalek spaceship, that's where we need to be."

"Not yet," Mickey said, shaking his head. "Doesn't take as long as the Dimension jump does to charge, but it still needs twenty-minutes, half-hour between hops." He said regretfully. It was technology he and Pete had thrown together when the jumps kept getting them closer to the Doctor, meant only for a quick hop that would hopefully get him closer, but it was only meant to be used once a hop."

"Then put down your gun." Sarah Jane insisted.

"Do what?"

"If you're carrying a gun, they'll shoot you dead. You said you still hope to see Rose, can't do that unless you're alive." She baited him just before she stepped out from behind the car they chose to hide behind. She shouts her surrender, hands in the air, and as much as he hates the thought he resigns. Mickey gave his gun a kiss goodbye, set it down, and followed Sarah Jane to his capture.

* * *

 

A beep, and the Doctor steps away from Rose and his daughter to see what's happening. "The Dalek Crucible." He said quietly, looking around at those gathered in his console room. Rose had already heard it all in his mind as they were being transferred. He'd counted the people he had inside, over and over, thought about Donna's mother and grandfather, Tim's Aunt. He knew Jack would survive, and her for the most part, but it circled back to who the Daleks would really want and his hearts would ache at the thought that he was once again putting her life on the line. And their daughter, their beautiful, smart, wonderful Jenny had been safely tucked away at school and he picked her up and brought her right into the slaughter.

He tried not to think about Jackie, tried not to wonder if she'd said her goodbyes in the other Universe as a just in case. But he did, and Rose heard it all.

"All aboard." He said with a nervous, resigned, sarcastic laugh.

"DOCTOR, YOU WILL STEP FORTH OR DIE." A Dalek commanded from outside the TARDIS.

"I don't think there's a 'live' option either way." Rose said, pulling Jenny closer.

"If we don't go out, they'll just get in." The Doctor nodded, coming back to his family and brushing her cheek with his thumb.

"You told me nothing could get through those doors." She said quietly, not wanting the others to hear. Though with the deafening silence of the console room, she wouldn't be surprised if everyone heard.

He shook his head in response.

"You've got extrapolator shielding," Jack reminded them.

"Last time we fought the Daleks, they were scavengers and hybrids and mad." The Doctor turned toward the Captain. "But this is a fully-fledged Dalek Empire, at the height of its power. Experts at fighting TARDISes, they can do anything. Right now, that wood door is just wood." He said, sounding so much stronger and less afraid than Rose knew he was, and her heart warmed at it. He called himself a coward so often, and sometimes in their worst moments she would agree. But this, this moment of him tucking it all away for the benefit of those on his ship, she'd never seen him braver.

"What about your hopper, Jackie?" Jack asked, coming over to her mother to have a look at it.

Her mum shrugged. "Told it would only work once every hour, something like that. Already used it to get to you lot.

"What about your manipulator?" Rose asked. "Least we could do is use it to get the rest out, yeah?"

Jack's eyes looked apologetic. "Went down with the power loss." He said regretfully.

"Right, then. All of us together, yeah?" The Doctor said, looking around the room.

Tim stepped closer. "Best way to go." He said with resigned bravery.

"Lived longer this way than if I'd stayed on the planet." Jenny smiled sadly.

"Donna?" The Doctor said as the seventh member of their group hadn't convened. She was standing stock still, staring at nothing. He took a few steps toward her. "Donna," he repeated her name, and she looked up in surprise. "I'm sorry, there's nothing else we can do." He said, reaching out and grasping her shoulder.

She smiled weakly. "I know." She nodded once.

"SURRENDER, DOCTOR, AND FACE YOUR DALEK MASTERS."

Rose laughed without humor, trying not to hold Jenny too tightly. "Daleks."

Jack laughed too. "Oh God." He said, taking a deep breath.

"It's been good though, hasn't it?" The Doctor asked, clinging to a positive. "All of us, all of it. Everything we did." He said to the group, turning back to Donna. "You were brilliant." He turned, looking at Tim. "And you were brilliant." He smiled a little wider, turning to Jack.

"Already know I'm brilliant," he said with a chuckle in his voice.

"And a good friend." He said, clapping Jack on the arm as he came back to the Tylers. He looked to Jackie first. "It was good to see you again." He said with meaning, allowing her to hug him as she remained speechless. He looked to Jenny. "Sorry." He said as he kissed her forehead.

"It's okay, Dad." She reassured, hugging him tight.

The Doctor moved to Rose, extending his hand to her, and she took it. "Thank you." He said, giving her all his love and regret through their bond.

She sent it back. "Wouldn't have missed it for the world." She promised, and she got up on her toes to kiss him chastely, perhaps for the last time, before they moved together and lead their family and friends out the TARDIS and into the crucible.

"DALEKS REIGN SUPREME! ALL HAIL THE DAAALEKS!" A red Dalek seemed to lead the chant as hundred if not thousands of golden shelled Daleks repeated it as the Doctor, Rose, and the rest appeared before them. There were just so many, and Rose's heart pounded. The idea of opening the TARDIS and taking the heart into her again entered her mind, but the Doctor's fear spiked at the idea.

"But it can't kill me, I won't burn." She reminded him.

"But it could kill her. She's weak from what the Daleks did to her, taking her heart wouldn't be a good idea." He said, sighing with regret out loud. "And besides, doing that here … I don't even want to think what could go wrong."

"BEHOLD, DOCTOOR! BEHOLD THE MIGHT OF THE TRUE DALEK RACE!" The red Dalek taunted.

The Doctor looked over their shoulders, likely checking on everyone, and she felt his confusion and minor frustration.

"Donna, you're no safer in there." He called just before the doors slammed shut. "What!" He yelled, and he darted for the doors while Rose placed herself in front of her daughter, Mum, and Tim. Jack seemed to understand roughly what she was doing, and even though it wasn't his instincts, he stood protecting them as well.

Rose could hear the banging on the TARDIS, the faint sound of Donna's muffled voice yelling through the doors.

"It wasn't me!" He shouted back. "I didn't do anything." He then whipped around, moving toward the red Dalek, looking it in the eye stalk. "What did you do?" He demanded.

"THIS IS NOT OF DALEK ORIGIN." It replied.

"Stop it," The Doctor growled. "She's my friend, now open the door and let her out."

"THIS IS TIME LORD TREACHERY." The Dalek countered.

"Me? The door closed on its own!" The Doctor's voice went higher.

"NEVERTHELESS, THE TARDIS IS A WEAPON AND IT WILL BE DESTROYED." It said, as casually as a Dalek could say anything, and a trap door beneath the TARDIS opened up and she disappeared with Donna still inside. At the last moment, Rose heard the Old Girl's surprise, like she hadn't really expected it to happen, like she knew the whole time that she was doing the right thing by trapping Donna inside her until that one moment.

"What's you done?" Rose demanded, feeling her years of progress in taming the wolf snapping away as she charged toward the Doctor and the Dalek. He stuck out his arm and caught her before she could do anything to cause more problems.

"Where is it going?" He demanded for them both.

"THE CRUCIBLE HAS A HEART OF Z-NEUTRINO ENERGY. THE TARDIS WILL BE DEPOSITED INTO THE CORE." It explained.

"You can't! You've taken the defenses down, it'll be torn apart." The Doctor yelled.

"That's a living thing, and there's another living, breathing person in there." Rose yelled at the same time, knowing it was futile but also knowing the Doctor wouldn't let her try ripping a Dalek apart with her bare hands.

She was angry enough she thought she'd get pretty far into the project before another Dalek would think to try and exterminate her.

"Let her go!" Jack yelled behind.

"THE FEMALE AND THE TARDIS WILL PERISH TOGETHER. OBSERVE." The Dalek said, pointing it's blaster arm toward a screen, showing the TARDIS bobbing along in a glowing pool that reminded Rose of Lava. "THE LAST CHILD OF GALLIFREY IS POWERLESS."

"Please, I'm begging you." The Doctor said, "Put me in her place, you can do anything to me, I don't care, just get her out of there." He begged.

And while Rose would normally try and stop him there was something strange in her mind that drew her attention to the screen. The TARDIS was humming in reassurance, trying as hard as she could with the distance to let them know it would be alright, that she and Donna were fine.

"YOU ARE CONNECTED TO THE TARDIS, NOW FEEL IT DIE!" The Dalek taunted, and Rose took the Doctor's hand as he turned to watch it.

"She's safe." Rose told him, though he didn't ease up or reply in anyway.

"TOTAL TARDIS DESTRUCTION IN TEN RELS, NINE, EIGHT …."

"I don't understand." The Doctor said in her mind, panic growing in his mind. "Emergency Program One would not work this early unless I activated it."

The TARDIS disappeared, and with it the hum she was sending to reassure. But that was the thing, Rose could feel through the Doctor, through her own bond with the ship, that she was simply too far away to connect to them right now. There was no loss of life, she just disappeared.

"THE TARDIS HAS BEEN DESTROYED. NOW TELL ME, DOCTOR, WHAT DO YOU FEEL? ANGER? SORROW? DESPAIR?"

The Doctor took a deep, shaky breath. "Yeah," He said bluntly, his mind calculating how the TARDIS escaped when Donna was barely taught to turn a few knobs.

"THEN IF EMOTIONS ARE SO IMPORTANT, SURELY WE HAVE ENHANCED YOU?" The Dalek taunted, and Rose whirled around, ready to give the Dalek a piece of her mind when the Doctor's hand in hers tightened.

"Yeah?" Jack said, "Feel this!" He said, taking his handgun from it's holster and emptying the clip.

"EXTERMINATE!" The Red Dalek countered, shooting Jack.

He collapsed on the ground.

"Uncle Jack!" Jenny gasped out, and thankfully Jackie caught her before she went over.

"It's okay, Goldielocks." Tim said, clutching her hand, seeming to will Jenny to look at him which she eventually complied with. "It's okay." He repeated, and Rose smiled at the warmth one of her best friends showed her daughter when her mother seemed too stunned to do much more than clutch at her granddaughter.

"ESCORT THEM TO THE VAULT. THEY ARE THE PLAYTHINGS OF DRAVOS NOW." The red Dalek said as a few gold ones came over to usher the five of them somewhere else on the Crucible.

Rose looked over her shoulder at Jack, catching him winking before the Daleks surrounded him.

"He's still alive." She sighed mentally with relief.

"Of course. But I'm not worried about how he survived." The Doctor replied, but they didn't continue their quiet conversation. It was probably for the best in case the Daleks somehow noticed they didn't need words to talk.

* * *

 

A heart beat. In her head. It was that really, really strange sound that kept Donna from leaving the TARDIS at the same time as everyone else. It was in her head, and she realized the second time it brought her up short that it wasn't so much an actual heart beat as a hum that sounded like one. She'd looked up at the TARDIS ceiling, seeing the lights around the console room glowing in time with it.

"What are you telling me?" She asked the time ship softly, wondering if she'd get more of a reply. She felt her eyes drawn to that bloody hand, seeing it glowing steady and golden. How? How did it do that? Rose never did say, the Doctor seemed to ignore it, and she was fairly certain Psychboy had a clue.

Kneeling down beside it, she took a good look at the hand.

It looked healthy, all things considered when she remembered it had been lopped off something like six or seven years ago. At least that was according to the stories Rose had told her. It looked just like one of the Doctor's hands, which it was really, except she'd expected it to look … different. Aged. It was like something had been keeping it much more preserved than a limb normally would be.

She heard the Doctor talking, calling for her, and she got up to head out when the TARDIS doors slammed shut.

"Doctor!" She charged at the door, pounding on it. "Let me out!" She yelled, hearing him on the other side just barely.

The heart beat hummed eased up, changed to something she thought sounded a lot like a reassurance, calm.

She took a deep breath, then another, allowing a space ship to calm her when she had no idea what was going on, or why it was happening to her in the first place.

Then the whole thing started shaking, and the surprise in the hum didn't exactly settle her nerves in the matter.

Tossed about the ship, sparks flying and flames igniting, Donna felt a scream coming out her mouth more than she heard it. She ducked, she stumbled, she made her way back to the console. It was safer there, had to be. She could fit under the panel, hide there until they were deposited where ever they were.

Then again, flames could not be good, and the smoke was starting to build. She may be safe from injury, but she doubted she'd survive smoke inhalation. Another sharp, sideways, violent shake knocked her and the hand jar to one side out from under the console, the next back in toward it. She caught the grating, her fingers aching as it seemed the shaking was about to stop. She heard the smash at the same second, noting the jar was broken, the hand laying only a couple feet away.

Donna shifted away from it on instinct, feeling a hard lump dig in to her ribs. She reached into her pocket, surprised to find the vial Tim had handed her all those months ago with barely more than a slight crack and a chip near the topper for damage.

"Hey, Most Important Woman," Tim had said, and Donna had noticed him handing her a vial. "Pocket this."

Donna had laughed. "Seriously."

Tim shrugged. "Might come in handy."

Might. Come. In handy.

"Oh you have got to be kidding me, Pyschboy." She said in disbelief.

Donna looked at the hand laying on the grating glistening against the flames and glowing gold more rapidly than it had before. It was like a blatant hint, a giant, neon arrow pointing her where to go. Scrambling, she crawled over to it. She hesitated, grimaced at the idea, then picked up the hand. "Oh my god," She cringed, turning it so the palm was up before pulling the stopper of the vial out with her teeth. She poured the contents on the hand, watched at the liquid eerily absorbed into the hand a touch too quickly.

The hand started glowing steadily, a little too bright, and a Donna began to feel … pulled. The gold light went up her arm, circling her, making her gasp at the very strange, burning tickle that ran through her nerves. When the fingers of the hand twitched, she lost it.

Tossing it a few feet away with a scream, she felt a surge go through her before being shoved back against the hot grating. Her head ached, and her flesh was a little tender where it kept touching the metal, but she managed to get up.

The hand was still glowing. Still twitching, and then suddenly the gold light turned into the shape of a body.

The Doctor's body.

It bolted up, the light fading and revealing a flesh and blood version of the Doctor that didn't look quite right somehow.

"Oh, Hello!" He said with a big, cheeky grin before taking in the sights. "Oh, blimey, what's going on here? Can we dematerialize, do you think?" He said, getting up and moving to the controls like it was any other day.

And Donna tried not to watch, because there in front of her was proof that Rose had never lied about just how human the Doctor looked.

"Here we go then." He said as the dematerialization started. He then pulled a fire extinguisher out from beneath the console and went about putting out the flames. When everything seemed to calm down, he came back over and stood a few feet away from her, looking around. "Alright, so, first order of business, who exactly are you?" He said, looking at down at her.

Donna stared back, holding his eye as she got to her feet. He waited patiently, and while she kept hoping he would start laughing at any moment she realized that wasn't going to happen.

"It's me." She said weakly. "It's Donna."

"Donna," he said, grinning again though not as big as before. "Sorry I don't remember who you are. Blimey must have been one hell of a party, don't know who you are." He put his hands on his hips but didn't break eye contact. "Clearly I'm naked, and I … umm, where's Ro-… you know what? How about I get clothes on first?"

"Yeah," Donna nodded, "Good idea." She said, turning around.

"Oh! Look at that! TARDIS provided me some, isn't that nice." He rambled on cheerily behind her. "Suit, suit and a t-shirt, and trainers! Look at that, I'm all geek chic! Very skinny legs. Wow, I'm slim, very slim. Never really got a good look at myself post regeneration, though I don't remember much. Not the first time that happened."

Through all his chin flapping, Donna could hear the distinct sound of his trousers being zipped and took that as her cue that it was safe to turn around. He was pulling on his deep purple t-shirt when she caught his eye, and she noted the nervousness there.

"So," he said, plopping down a moment to put on his black trainers on. "I talk a lot, you haven't said a word yet, and I'm … I'm sorry, I have to ask, where's Rose?"

"Gone." She said, and his entire posture drooped.

"Oh," He said.

"Yeah, she left with umm, with you." She gestured at him, but realized that this was obviously not the Doctor, not her Doctor.

He furrowed his brow. "Whaddya mean she left with me? I know regenerations are hard, but how was that possible. And where did you come from, anyway? And what happened to the Sycorax?"

"The Sica-what?" Donna asked as this Doctor put on and buttoned his black suit jacket. She noted there were no pin strips in either it or its matching trousers.

"Sycorax." He said. "Last thing I remember, and it's a very foggy memory, is a sword fight with their leader, and he swung down and…." He stopped, his eyes going wide. "No!" He said. "No, no, no, no, no! No! I've only got one, what!?"

"Okay, you need to calm down." Donna said slowly.

"Calm down?" His voice broke. "How can I, when, I mean…." He looked at Donna with sad, disbelieving eyes. "I'm a meta-crisis!" He whined.

"A what?" Donna asked as he went to the console, pushed a few buttons, and the Doctor, or whatever, plopped on the jumpseat.

She came and sat by him, and watched on the monitor as moments went by. All seemed to be of him in the TARDIS, all as if shot from a movie, and some, well, some scenes involving Rose she had to look away. No matter how fast they went fluttering by, there was no way Donna was going to see both of them naked, even if one of them was only seen on a video screen.

"Well," He said, and she peeked up at the Meta-Doctor-man to see not only were his ears flaming and his eyes wide with shock, but he also seemed to have gone paler. "Guess Rose took the regeneration well after all." He continued watching for another few seconds before the light on the screen cut out and he looked to Donna with big, sad eyes. "I'm a meta-crisis."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning I'm not full Time Lord. I'm part human. I can feel only one heart, can't hold my breath more than a couple seconds, my mind doesn't feel quite so ... I'm warm, much warmer than I should be. And I've got six years fewer memories than … him. And her. I regenerated to save Rose's life, and even if I'm not fully me, I feel what I always have." He took a deep breath, "But that's something I'll have to deal with after. Because right now, I'm assuming the worst is happening." He looked to Donna. "Pretty sure I can still do this because I can feel the TARDIS in my head." He lifted his fingers toward her temple. "May have a peek? Just at your memories with me. It'll help me understand more of what's going on here both with you and what ever is happening outside."

Donna nodded, and closed her eyes.

"Anything else, just imagine a door in front of the memory."

It all flashed before her, every moment spent in his presence, at rapid speed. She blinked a couple times, and then they stopped. She opened her eyes, seeing the mixed emotions on this Doctor's face.

"Bloody Daleks," He bit out. "Miss six years of a brilliant looking life only to come alive to face them again."

"What do we do?" She asked him

He took a deep breath, his brown eyes appearing darker than normal but his voice calm and stead. "We get to work."

* * *

 

She didn't like being separated from the Doctor by a few feet, let alone her daughter by a few feet more. Jenny was in soldier mode, having found some fragment of that life still in her and putting it to use to make it look like nothing terrified her. She was in the middle, the three spotlight-like cells holding her, Jackie, and Tim spaced evenly out behind she and the Doctor. She'd seen her mother putting on a brave face as well, glancing at her as well as Jenny with a lot of frequency like it was keeping her strong. And Tim, well, Tim had sort of zoned out with a blank expression that seemed more accepting than anything. Every once in a while it was like he came back to them long enough to offer Rose of Jenny a reassuring grin but not much more than that.

Davros entered the room once they were all settled in their holding spots, and Rose thought he was smiling but it was really hard to tell.

"Excellent," He said. "Even when powerless a Time Lord is best contained."

"Still scared of me then." The Oncoming Storm said conversationally, reaching forward to test the limits of their confinement. There was a ripple near the edge of the light where the Doctor's fingers made contact.

"It's time we talked, Doctor, after so very long."

"Oh, no, no, no, no, we're not doing the nostalgia tour, I wanna know what's happening. Right here, right now. 'Cause the Supreme Dalek said Vault, yeah?" He looked around. "As in dungeon? Cellar, Prison? You are not in charge of the Daleks, are you?" The Doctor poked the beast, and Rose noticed the beast flinched. "They've got you locked away down here in the basement like, what A servant? Slave? Court jester?"

"Crazed relative." Rose offered.

"Oooh, yes, I like that one." The Doctor agreed, glancing at her as he put his hands in his pockets. He looked back at Davros expectantly. "So what is it?"

"We have … an arrangement." Davros said, sounding nearly embarrassed by the idea.

"No, no, no, I've got the word. You're the Dalek's pet!" The Doctor goaded him.

Davros stared at him, then edged his seat toward Rose. She watched him, steeled herself for what ever he planned to say.

"So full of fire, is he not?" He said casually. "And to think you bent and re-wove time to stay with him for eternity. His wolf. His pet."

"Leave her alone." The Doctor warned.

"She is mine to do as I please." Davros countered.

"So if you know that, you know what I've done to the Daleks in the past."

"I do, but I know you no longer have such power. It was the one thing you seemed to fail to foresee, unlike it has appeared to Dalek Caan."

"Sorry?" She said, glancing at the Doctor to see he was just as confused.

"It was foretold that you would be here, as would the rest of your pitiful ensemble. Even the Supreme Dalek would not dare to contradict the prophecies of Dalek Caan." He said, gesturing behind him.

She wondered how she didn't notice before: the exposed Dalek sitting in open casing, it's eye wide and wild.

"So cold and dark," It said in a sing-song tone. "Fire is coming, the endless flames."

"How did he end up like that?" Rose asked, looking between the Doctor, Davros, and Caan. "He was, he was normal in New York. Dalek normal, anyhow."

"Remember I told you that the last Dalek escaped?" The Doctor replied, arching a brow. "It was him, when he escaped Manhattan he re-entered the Time War, except he was unprotected."

"And he saw time, its infinite complexity and majesty raging through his mind. And he saw you. All of you." Davros added.

"This I have foreseen." Caan said, sounding all the Universe like he lost a few nuts and bolts in his trip. "In the wild, in the wind. The Doctor will be here, as witness. At the end of everything. The Doctor and his precious Children of Time." He giggled. "And one of them will die." He laughed a little more, like a giddy child.

The Doctor's eyes filled with rage, and if he could charge, she was sure he would. "Was it you, Caan?" He bit out. "Did you kill Donna? Why did the TARDIS door close, tell me!"

"Oh, that's it! The anger! The Fire! The rage of a Time Lord who butchered millions." Davros taunted.

"Don't you dare." Jenny snapped behind them, and Rose turned to flash her daughter a warning to be silent. Jenny hesitated, but complied.

Rose looked back at the Doctor, seeing him staring at a spot on the floor, his anger changed to shame.

"Why so shy?" Davros taunted. "Show your lover, your companions. Show them your true self. Dalek Caan has promised me that, too."

"I have seen." He said, his voice so child like for a Dalek. "At the time of ending, the Doctor's soul will be revealed."

"What does that mean?" The Doctor asked, trying to stir the storm inside again.

"We will discover it together." Davros replied. "Our final journey, because the ending approaches, the testing begins."

"Testing of what?" The Doctor asked.

"The reality bomb."

* * *

 

"Sonic lipstick?" Mickey asked quietly after she and Mickey slipped away from the Daleks unnoticed, looking through a windowed door.

"I'd have never been able to get away with a screwdriver like the Doctor's in the 21st century." She replied, and they both watched as the Daleks moved and herded the other people they'd come with into a tighter group. They heard the muffled command to start testing, and the people they were just with moments ago vanished into nothing.

Both stood silent, Mickey noting how Sarah Jane had as much outward reaction as he had. The disbelief was in her eyes but she made no effort to express her horror.

As the Daleks left, and they prepared to step out, something rattling in the vents stopped them short. A panel on the wall was thrown open, startling them both and instantly making Mickey wish he had his gun. That feeling didn't entirely ebb when Jack rolled out.

"Just my luck. I climb through two miles of ventilation shafts, chasing life signs on this thing, and I find you." He said as he tapped his vortex manipulator.

"Who were you hoping for?" Mickey asked.

"Honestly? Donna Noble, but considering I noted a pair, I didn't know who to expect to find with her." He turned to Sarah Jane, giving her a salute. "We meet at last, Miss Smith, though I had hoped it would have been under the better circumstances we were supposed to."

"Oh, and what would those have been?" She asked.

"Can't say, not my surprise to spoil." He said with a charming grin that had Mickey rolling his eyes.

"Earth's in danger, and you're flirting." Mickey snorted.

"And you're sounding more like the Doctor." Jack countered.

"And where is he?" Mickey asked.

Jack looked at his feet, and it became clear that he didn't need to answer.

"There is something we can do." Sarah Jane said with determination that didn't translate to her eyes or motions as she reached in her pocket and pulled something out. "I've brought this, it was given to me by a Verron Soothsayer. He said 'this is for the End of Days.'" She said, showing Mickey and Jack the diamond necklace.

Jack's eyes widened and mouth contorted in awe. "Is that a Warp Star?" He asked, and Sarah Jane nodded.

"Gonna tell me what a Warp Star is?" Mickey asked, looking between the two of them.

"A warpfold conjugation trapped in carbonised shell." Jack explained, meeting Mickey's gaze. "It's an explosion, Mickey. An explosion waiting to happen."


	32. Journey's End pt 2

Donna watched the Meta-Doctor, as she decided to think of him, watch the monitor, mumbling something about z-neutrino something. She'd asked him what it was all about, but he either thought her too stupid to understand or too scared to give it words. She seriously hoped for the latter.

He dashed off, leaving her alone in the console, the TARDIS hum having a subtle change. When did she start noticing the nuances of the time ship's hum, Donna didn't really know, but she found it both comforting and unsettling at once. Because while the Meta-Doctor had been here it was pretty flat, like the ship held no opinion or emotion, but the second he bolted down the corridor, the hum changed to apologetic.

He returned a few minutes later, collapsing on the grating with a bunch of parts and tools and started putting stuff together.

She sat next to him, wondering if the proper Doctor would have been this moody and broody if she ever had to travel with him alone.

"I don't mean to be rude," She said in a gentle voice, pausing in hopes that he would look up. He didn't. "Exactly how did you come to be? I mean, you're a hand. Or, were a hand. So how is it possible?"

The Meta-Doctor looked up, considering the question. He then lifted his right hand, the one he came from, and licked it. Then grimaced. "Oh, that's nasty." He commented, then turned to Donna. "Hand was kept in a liquid from the 50th century. Vitamcon, keeps tissue alive without proper circulation. Normally used with heads, like the Face of Boe. Ever meet the Face of Boe?" He paused to take a breath, and Donna shook her head. "No? Literally just a head, said to be billions of years old. Anyway, not normally used to preserve hands, Vitamcon. I find it odd that I, he, someone didn't just burn it."

"Alright." Donna said as he breathed again. "So do you know why it was glowing?"

He looked at his hand. "Oh," He said, looking it over. "Vortex energy affecting the inert huon particles in my system left over from when I took it out of Rose. A speck here or there isn't all that dangerous to a Time Lord. But that's all, nothing more, just the hand being stored too close to the Time Rotor. I seem to get the sense that the other me and Rose spent a lot of time in the Vortex. But your original question was how I came to be, wasn't it?" He realized. "In your memories you used an elixir of life. Or, a wanna be one, anyway. That stuff works on dead tissue."

"It brought all those people back to life." She said, suddenly understanding.

"Oh yes," He said. "It works wonderfully to restore but not properly." He said, his grin falling.

"Meaning?" Donna prodded.

He met her eye. "Well, not a proper elixir of life from Karn. Means I'm not a proper meta-crisis. There was regeneration energy, but it was so old it may as well not have even been there. And elixirs would bring back life, but I was a limb, I only got a half life. A human life with a partial Time Lord brain. Which must mean you…." He furrowed his brow. "You weren't holding the hand when you poured the elixir on it, were you?"

"Umm." Donna responded.

He arched a brow. "You know what I'm building?" He asked. She shook her head. "A Z-Neutrino biological inversion catalyser."

"A what?" She asked.

"Good," He said with a smile. "Good, that's a good sign. Good, very good." He looked back to the device he'd been absently assembling during their mostly one-sided conversation. "You may recall Davros said he built those Daleks out of himself, as it was from your mind I got the memory. His genetic code runs through the entire race. If I can use this to lock the Crucible's transmission of the reality bomb onto Davros himself …"

"Reality bomb?"

"The thing we watched on the monitor. With the stars burning up." He stared at her as if she were stunned. "What did you think we were watching?"

"Oi, watch it Spaceman." She snapped at him.

"Oi, watch it Earthgirl," He snapped back, and both looked at each other in disbelief. "Sound like a bloody ape now, fanta … fantast…ic. Nope, teeth still aren't right for that." He grumbled.

"Oi, I ain't no ape. I get what's goin' on now, just wanted to make sure I was understandin'."

"And are you?" he asked, more teasing than callous this time.

"Yes, dumbo, it'll destroy the Daleks." She said. Well, guessed, really, but there was something doubly rude about this Meta-Doctor that she didn't want to sound more stupid than she had.

He smiled. "With the biggest backfire in history."

 

* * *

 

"Doctor, what happened?" Rose asked after what ever that was had ended. She'd watched on the projection as a group of humans turned into nothing.

"Electric energy, Miss Tyler." Davros answered before the Doctor could. "Every atom in existence is bound by an electrical field. The Reality Bomb cancels it out. Structure falls apart. It's nothing more than what you did the Daleks, I simply didn't have to burn to do it to the humans. That test was focused on the prisoners alone, full transmission will dissolve every form of matter. Unlike you, I'm not biased."

"Rose?" Jackie said behind her, but she ignored her mother for a moment. She also bit her tongue, keeping every word she wanted to yell back at that disgusting thing in a wheel chair to herself.

"The twenty-seven planets come one vast transmitter." The Doctor said through his teeth. "Blasting that wavelength …."

"Across the entire Universe." Davros cut him off, speaking as if he was admiring something beautiful. "Never stopping, never faltering, never fading. People and planets and stars will become dust, and the dust will become atoms, and the atoms will become nothing. And it will continue, breaking through the rift at the heart of the Medusa Cascade into every dimension, every parallel, every single corner of creation! This is my ultimate victory, Doctor! The destruction of reality itself!"

"So you're a suicidal maniac." Tim said, speaking for the first time since being led away. "Yeah, that makes sense."

"The boy, the boy, he's seen it too. Seen all that's to come." Caan suddenly pipped up, his sing-song tone sounding more manic. "He knows the prophecy that Caan does."

Davros laughed, and if he still had a belly it would have come from that. "You've had a prophet with you, yet you did not see this coming."

"Even Tim knows foreknowledge is dangerous." The Doctor said slowly.

"And in this case, your not wanting to hear it has been your downfall."

The screen flickers, changing, showing an image of Martha coming in more and more clearly with each passing second.

"This message is for the Dalek Crucible, repeat, can you hear me."

"Put me through." The Doctor said rather calmly.

"It begins," Davros said, pleased. "As Dalek Caan foretold. As your boy has seen."

"The Children of Time will gather. And one of them will die." Caan taunted.

"Stop saying that!" The Doctor snapped. "Put me through!" He demanded, and as he turned to focus on the screen, Rose looked around him to Tim. She met his eye, trying to convey she wanted some idea, hint, of what was about to come.

He shook his head. "No, Wolf Girl." He mouthed, glancing briefly at Jenny then shaking his head no again for good measure.

She allowed the guilty moment of feeling relieved before she remembered that they arrived with three other people, two of them were mortal, and then Tim had been quiet. So, so quiet. Like he was trying not to draw attention to himself.

"Doctor!" Martha's voice pulled her back to face the screen. "I'm sorry, I had to."

"Oh, but the Doctor is powerless. My prisoner." Davros said to the screen. "State your intent."

Martha held up a black square that looked like a chip. "I've got the Osterhagen key. Leave this planet and its people alone, or I'll use it." She threatened.

Rose shifted her gaze to the Doctor, wondering if he knew what that was.

"Osterhagen what?" He replied, face contorting with confusion. "What's an Osterhagen key?"

"There's a chain of twenty-five nuclear warheads, placed in strategic points beneath the Earth's crust." Martha explained. "If I use the key, they detonate and the Earth gets ripped apart."

Rose blinked, unable to do much else with a concept such as that being used.

"What?" The Doctor cried out. "Who invented that? Well, someone called Osterhagen, I suppose. Martha, are you insane?" He asked, and if he could move closer, he likely would have.

"It was made to be used if the suffering of the human race is so great, so without hope, that this becomes the final option."

"Of all the stories we've told you, and all the things we've seen and done together, do you really believe that right now, in this moment, the Earth is as without hope as it had been at any other time?" Rose asked her, finally finding her voice.

"It's more than just Earth though, isn't Rose?" She challenged. "And isn't that how we always looked at things? Took in the bigger picture? 'Cause I reckon that the Daleks need these twenty-seven planets for something, but what if it becomes twenty-six? What happens then, Daleks? Would you risk it?"

"She's good." Jenny said, earning what Rose would guess was a glare from both her parents. "Well she is." She said, squaring her shoulders and looking ahead.

"Captain Jack Harkness, calling all Dalek boys and girls!" Jack's voice pulled her attention back to the screen, finding it divided. Next to Martha was an image of Jack and Mickey, and Rose's heart ached at the sight of her once closest friend. "Are you receiving me? Don't send in your goons, or I'll set this thing off."

"Captain, what are you doing?" The Doctor said, low and in warning.

"I've got a warp star wired into the mainframe. I break this shell, the entire crucible goes up."

"Where did you get a warp star?" The Doctor asked, voice going high, hands in his hair before gesturing at the screen.

"From me," Sarah Jane said, stepping into view. "We had no choice, we saw what happened to the prisoners."

Rose took in a sharp breath, glancing at the Doctor to see him still fixed on the screen. But Davros, he paled, if that were possible, and stared at the screen as if he'd seen a ghost.

"Impossible." He said slowly. "That face … after all these years."

"Davros?" Sarah Jane practically spat his name. "It's been quite a while. Sarah Jane Smith, remember?" She reminded him.

Davros stared, then slowly started to smile. "Oh, this is meant to be!" He said gleefully. "The Circle of Time is closing. You were there, on Skaro, at the very beginning of my creation."

"And I've learned how to fight since then." Sarah Jane countered. "You let the Doctor go, or this warp star gets opened."

"I'll do it," Jack said honestly. "Don't imagine I won't."

"And the prophecy unfolds." Davros said, arms spread out to the side.

"The Doctor's soul is revealed." Caan giggled. "See him, see the heart of him."

"What?" Rose said, though it seemed to fall on deaf ears.

"The man who abhors violence, never carrying a gun. But this is the truth, Doctor. You take ordinary people and you fashion them into weapons. You produce soldiers. Behold, your children of Time, transformed into murderers. I made the Daleks, Doctor. You made this."

The Doctor bowed his head, clenched his fists, his eyes glassy in the light of his holding cell.

"No." Rose said, shaking her head. "No he didn't." She said firmly.

"You're one of the biggest murderers of the lot," Davros reminded her. "Committing genocide with the power of the Vortex. Killing more since then as well. His hands are stained, Miss Tyler, but yours are soaked. And he was the one who drenched them in it."

She smiled as she shook her head, letting out a mirthless snort when all became too much. "You think he did that?" She asked him. "You think he wanted me to absorb the vortex, wipe out a race? Became violent and feral, 'cause I don't. 'Nd you couldn't be more wrong about what's happening here right now, 'cause let me tell you something. This isn't the Children of Time turning murderers, these are human beings, residents of the planet you're using as a weapon to destroy everything, defending their home. The only thing that makes 'em different from the rest of humanity is that the Doctor made 'em familiar with the dangers of the Universe. While the rest of Earth are cowering or scrambling in fear, these people are doing what they can to stand for what's right. We all became what we are, soldiers or not, by choice. He didn't give us the weapons, he didn't even tell us to use them, it was always our choice to take a stand."

As she spoke, Rose could sense the Doctor looking over at her, but she dared not break eye contact with Davros, didn't want to see how her words were affecting the Doctor.

"You stand there and defend the actions of a man who keeps running and never looks back. Tell me, Miss Tyler. Would any of these people be where they are if it weren't for him?"

"No," She said, shaking her head. "We'd be worse for it."

"How many have died in his name?" Davros challenged.

"How many have lived?" She countered.

"None after I have fulfilled my task." He ended their banter.

"It's the Crucible or the Earth." Martha spoke up, returning the ultimatums placed before Davros. She lifted the key, waving it around, then she disappeared.

A thump behind them caused Rose to turn around to find the four who had been on screen were now behind Tim, Jenny, and Jackie.

"Don't move," The Doctor warned, a touch of calm to his voice. "All of you, stay still."

"Guard them." Davros ordered, and a few Daleks came around to the newcomers. "On your knees, all of you. Surrender."

"Do as he says." The Doctor said with a nod.

When the four of them were on their knees, Daleks keeping watch, Rose caught the Doctor's eye. Something changed, though she didn't know what since their situation seemed to be growing worse by the second. But he somehow seemed a little lighter as he gave Davros his attention once more.

"The final prophecy is in place. The Doctor and his children, all gathered as witnesses." Davros said, relaxing in his chair. "Supreme Dalek, the time has come! Detonate the reality bomb."

"Davros, just listen to me. Stop what you're doing, and listen." The Doctor tried to reason, only to have Davros laugh in return.

"Nothing can stop the detonation. Nothing and no one." He replied, laughing louder.

It was as it died down, in the virtual silence of the vault, that Rose swore she heard a hum. A smug hum, as if something was wanting to taunt.

A moment later, her heart caught as gasps from the three behind her and an 'Oh my god' from Jack told her she was not the only one hearing that beautiful, wonderful, wheezing noise of the TARDIS engines grinding. Slowly, she materialized before them.

"But that's…." The Doctor said behind her.

"Impossible." Davros finished the Doctor's sentence as TARDIS finished materializing.

When the doors opened, and light flooded from within, Rose half expected to see Donna walk out just as she once had all those years ago, filled with the heart of the TARDIS.

Instead came the Doctor. Her Doctor. In a black suit and a purple t-shirt reminding her strongly of her first Doctor.

He stepped out, a gun of some sort in his hand, prepared to fire when something struck him down, stunning him a moment and causing him to drop the weapon.

"Activate holding cell," She heard Davros call out, and the Doctor in black slowly got to his feet as Donna ran out the TARDIS. She dropped, picking up the weapon, looking all the world like a panicked action star until the action stopped and she stared at the weapon. "Doctor! I don't know what to do." She told the new Doctor, looking away just before she got zapped the same way the new Doctor did. She was hit with enough force to go flying back into a control panel, crashing on the floor behind it.

"Donna," The Doctor in brown said behind Rose. "Donna, are you all right?"

"Destroy the weapon." Davros instructed, and one of the nearby Daleks shot at it, causing it to explode. Davros hit a few controls on his chair, changing the image on the screen to show the stolen planets surrounded with a white glow. "Stand witness, Time Lord. Stand witness humans. Your strategies and words have failed. Your weapons are useless. And, oh." He paused. "The end of the universe has come."

Rose took a deep breath, staring straight at the screen as a Dalek's voice counted down to the end of everything.

The the screen cut out, and nothing happened. Rose looked to the Doctor in brown, who looked just as confused until something caught his eye and made them go wide.

Rose turned, having a hard time wanting to see the Doctor in black, noticing he had only just noticed the Doctor looking over and turned in time with Rose.

Donna Noble grinned back with more confidence than Rose had ever seen her have.

"Oh, closing all Z-Neutrino relay loops using an internalized synchronous back feed reversal loop?" She flicked a switch. "That button there."

"What?" Rose laughed.

"Donna," The Doctor said with the same disbelief Rose had. "You can't even change a plug."

"D'you wanna bet Time Boy?" She asked, and Rose heard Tim laughing hysterically off to the side.

"You'll suffer for this." Davros threatened.

Donna grinned at him, amused, then flicked another switch. Rose looked over her shoulder to see Davros become shocked by his own chair. "Oh, bio-electric dampening field with a retrogressive arc inversion."

"Donna, what are you going on about?" Rose asked, her smile growing involuntarily.

"Exterminate her." Davros commanded, but Donna just grinned as she went about working the controls before her. She looked up, caught Rose's eye, and winked.

"WEAPONS NON-FUNCTIONAL." A Dalek cried out.

"Mactrotransmission of K-filter wavelength blocking Dalek weaponry in a self-replicating energy blindfold matrix." She explained though made no sense, at least not to Rose.

"How'd you work that out?" The Doctor in brown asked from behind her, and Rose saw the quick, fleeting dread on the Doctor in black's face.

"Time Lord." He said. "Part Time Lord."

"Part human." Donna said with utter giddiness. "Oh yes! That was a two-way biological meta crisis."

"The Doctor Donna." The Doctor in brown said, and Rose remembered how the Ood kept referring to Donna. "They saw it coming."

"Holding cells deactivated." Donna announced, and the light around the six surrounded by them went out. "And seal the vault." Donna said as Rose rushed to Jenny's side, turning to see the Doctor in brown, her Doctor, look over the other one. "Well don't just stand there, you skinny boys in suits, get to work." Donna chided.

Mayhem among the Daleks started to break loose, the Doctors and Donna chatting about while the rest of those brought aboard begin pushing and shoving Dalek's out of the way. Once she was sure Jenny was okay, Rose turned to see Davros coming back to his sense and marched toward him.

"Rose!" Jack called out, and she turned, looking over her shoulder in time to see him tossing her a gun. She caught it daftly, pointing it at Davros as she stepped in front of his chair.

She hated guns, hated they way they felt in her hand, but she hated the thing in the chair more.

"You will not pull the trigger." He said calmly.

"You were the one who pointed out that I have blood on my hands." Rose said, cocking the gun. With a foot propped on the base, she craned her head toward the controls as she heard the two Doctor's and Donna nattering on. "Anyone want to explain how I now have two mates, and Donna's part time lord?"

"Mate!" One of the Doctors, the one in black Rose assumed, choked on the word.

"Not … not quite yet." The other Doctor nervously replied,

"I used the elixir of life Tim made me smuggle a few months back on the hand in the TARDIS. It absorbed the liquid, and using the cellular memory stored from the last regeneration formed a new Doctor. I was holding the hand when the potion activated, and because I had previously had huons in my system it picked up on that and tried to connect me to it, thinking I was somehow the same. Not a proper elixir, after all. Link would have stayed dormant except that little spark kicked it to life. Thank you Davros." Donna explained, and Rose couldn't help but smirk at the way Davros clearly would have rolled his eyes if he could. "Part human, part Time Lord. And I got the best bit of the Doctor. I got his mind." She added.

"So there's three of you?" Rose heard Sarah Jane ask.

"Well, three and half. Can't forget Jenny," Rose heard her Doctor say, their voices becoming distinguishable somehow.

"Who's Jenny?" The other Doctor asked.

"I'm Jenny."

"Mine and Rose's … daughter."

"You have a what?" Came from multiple people in various ways but no one louder than the Meta Crisis.

"You promised me, Dalek Caan." Davros said, backing his chair away from Rose and turning to the crazed Dalek not far away. She kept her gun trained on him but backed up until a cool hand reached out and caught her around the waist. A hum of love and calm against her skin, the former in desperate waves as if she needed reminding, told her who she stood beside.

"Oh I think he did." She heard her Time Lord say above her head. "Something's been manipulating the timelines for ages, getting Donna Noble to the right place at the right rime."

"This would always have happened. I only helped, Doctor." Caan replied graciously.

"You betrayed the Daleks!" Davros cried.

"I saw the Daleks, what we have done throughout time and space. I saw the truth of us, Creator, and I decreed 'No more.'"

"Heads up," Jack called out, and Rose looked up to see the Red Dalek descending. She chanced a glance at Jack who nodded back at her, and she kept her gun trained on Davros.

"DAVROS, YOU HAVE BETRAYED US." It cried out as much as a Dalek could.

"It was Dalek Caan," Davros protested, and Rose snorted.

"THE VAULT WILL BE PRUGED, YOU WILL ALL BE EXTERMINATED." It said, and it shot at the control panel, knocking Rose and the Doctor to their feet and making her lose hold of the gun.

"Like I was saying, feel this!" Jack shouted, and Rose heard the shot followed by the exploding Dalek as she disentangled herself from her Time Lord.

"You okay?" She asked him, cupping his face as they got to their knees, checking over her Doctor to make sure he was alright. He smiled very wide, eyes lighting up, and Rose had to wonder until she realized the stray thought that went through her mind.

"Yeah," he said, climbing to his feet and helping Rose up as he looked at the control panel. "Oh, we've lost the Megnetron!" He whined. "And there's only one planet left. Guess which one?" He said with a huff before an idea sparked. "But we can use the TARDIS." He dashed inside, and Rose watched him go before bending down and grabbing the gun once again.

"The Prophecy must complete." Caan reminded.

"Don't listen to him," Davros yelled.

"What prophecy?" Rose asked looking to Tim.

"I have seen the end of everything Dalek," Caan answered as Tim gave a sideways glance toward the Meta Crisis and Donna. "And you must make it happen, Doctor."

"He's right," The Meta Crisis said without much thought. "'Cause with or without a reality bomb, this Dalek Empire's big enough to slaughter the cosmos. They've got to be stopped."

"You're just after regenerating, yeah?" Rose asked, coming around and looking him in the eye for the first time. She saw him swallow hard. "Why did that happen? Because I destroyed the Daleks by doing something stupid and foolish."

"Because I was a coward." He countered.

"No you weren't," Rose shook her head. "You were the Doctor."

"And a I still am," He said, looking down at the controls and rapidly started pushing buttons, flipping leavers. "You saved my life from a fleet of Daleks, allow me to return the favor." He said as Daleks began exploding, and the Crucible shook about.

"What have you done?" The Doctor cried out, and the Meta Crisis turned and stared him down.

"Fulfilling the prophecy." He said without a hint of regret, the Destroyer of Worlds in his full incarnation with possibly a touch too little Time Lord to make him see the wrong.

Or maybe it was simply because, despite his claims, he was not the Doctor.

"Do you know what you've done?" The Doctor yelled as yet another vicious shake caused Rose to loose her footing. "Now get in the TARDIS. Everyone, all of you, Run!" He commanded.

"Jenny!" Rose yelled, noting her daughter coming round with Jackie. She watched Tim dart in with Martha, Jack, and Mickey close behind. She looked to the Doctor, having not seen the Meta Crisis or Donna run in, but he nodded and waved her over.

Dropping the gun, Rose ran inside.


	33. We Are Gathered Here Today

"No one's hurt, yeah?" Rose asked, taking care to look over Jenny.

"Mum, stop fussing." She said with a grin that Rose couldn't help returning before giving her a kiss on the forehead.

"So she's really your kid?" Mickey asked as he came to stand beside Jackie with his arms folded.

"My one and only." She replied.

"Thought you said you'd never have 'em." He raised his chin in a familiar gesture that had her moving over and throwing her arms around him.

"It's so good to see you," She said. "Despite the end of the World stuff."

"You too, babe." He said as she stepped back.

The TARDIS doors closed, and she turned to see her Doctor coming up the ramp.

"And off we go!" He said, pulling the lever and causing the TARDIS to shake before taking off.

"But what about the Earth?" Sarah Jane asked from a position Rose couldn't quite see her from. "It's stuck in the wrong part of space."

"I'm on it." He said, and Rose moved over to his side to see what he was doing. He typed a few things on the panel, bringing up a screen on the monitor. "Torchwood Hub, this is the TARDIS, are you receiving."

"Loud and clear!" Gwen replied as they popped up. "Is Jack there?"

"Oh yes." The Doctor said. "Now, you two, I want you to open up that rift manipulator, send all the power to us."

"Doing it now, sir!" Ianto replied.

"Please don't call me that." The Doctor grumbled, earning a chuckle from Rose and a smirk from Ianto.

"What's that for?" Gwen asked.

"A tow rope." He said with a grin. "Call Rose's phone if you run in to trouble, or Jack's I suppose. TARDIS is going to be working hard as it is, don't want to make simultaneous connections if I don't need to, alright." He said, smacking the controls and typing again. "Sarah, What's your son's name?"

"Luke, he'd called Luke. And the computer's called Mister Smith."

"How did you know she had a son?" Rose asked him as he typed.

"She asked if he could have come with us." He said with a sly grin. "I did call ahead to ensure I wasn't dropping by at a bad time."

"Did you tell her the reason for the visit?" Rose asked, and he shook his head before bringing up Sarah Jane's home.

"Calling Luke and Mister Smith. This is the Doctor!"

Luke popped up on the screen. "Is Mum there?" he asked and Rose stepped aside to allow Sarah Jane to see him.

"I'm here, hi!" She said, tears of relief in her eyes as her hands clasped over her heart.

"Now, Mister Smith," The Doctor said. "I want you to harness the rift power and loop it around the TARDIS, you got that?"

"I regret I will need remote access to TARDIS base code numerals," A computer voice that reminded Rose a lot of Ianto replied back, and Rose looked over at Jack who either didn't seem to notice, or probably wouldn't have cared. She just hoped Mister Smith wasn't an android.

"Oh blimey, that's gonna take a while." The Doctor said, rubbing between his eyes.

"No, no, no," Sarah Jane said, hand on the Doctor's arm before she peered back at the monitor. "K9! Out you come!"

"Affirmative, Mistress."

"Oh, he's so cute," Rose heard Jenny say as she came up beside her Dad. "Can we have one."

"Convince River to keep one in the dorm, and I'll build you one for your birthday," The Doctor said cheekily before returning his attention to the monitor. "K9, give Mister Smith the base code, yeah! That's a good dog!" He cooed.

"Master, TARDIS base code now being transferred. The process is simple." It replied.

"Good. Now then, you lot." He said, looking around at the overwhelming amount of people currently inside their home. "Sarah, hold that down. Mickey," he beckoned. "You hold that. 'Cause you know why this TARDIS is always rattling about?"

"Because it needs more than two people to fly it." Rose smirked at him, stepping back with arms folded over her chest as she watched him go.

"Six pilots, right you are Sweetheart. Jenny, Love, that there. There's a good girl." He said before he moved one. "And for years I had to do it single handed, then you learned how and it made it a little easier. Martha, keep that level." He paused to instruct. "But now, it looks like you and I get to sit back and relax for a bit. Jack," he said, but the Captain already seemed to be on it. "There you go. Tim, come here, you can have a hand in this, too." He said, guiding him to the right spot on the controls. The Doctor took a step back, looking at Rose, then Donna and the Meta Crisis standing by the doors, and then at the console surrounded by their friends and family. "Like it's meant to be flown! We've got the Torchwood Rift looped around the TARDIS by Mister Smith, and you lot are gonna fly Planet Earth back home." He moved to the switch, hand on it. "Allons-y," He beamed before flipping it and sending them on their way.

He moved and stood next to Rose near the jumpseat, watching as the Meta Crisis and Donna circled the lot flying the ship.

"Jenny's remembered quite a bit considering how long it's been for her." He noted.

"She's got Uncle Jack nearby, always helps."

"He does know what he's doing." He noted as Jack pointed something to Jenny and she nodded.

"You really trusted all of them to fly?" Rose asked suspiciously. He grabbed her hand.

"Auto pilot, more or less." He said, his grin growing as she smacked him on the arm. "You still want me?" He asked, his mental voice sounding more mesmerized than inquisitive. She looked up, meeting his eye.

"You really think after all this time …. He looks like you, but he's not you. I see that, hear that. I love you, have built my life with you, and I want to keep going on with you. There's no question. My heart belongs to only one Time Lord."

"He's like my former self," He said out loud but very softly. "He was born of blood and war. He'll need someone."

"And he'll have us."

"He committed genocide." He reminded her.

"So did we." She countered, and watched the argument leaving his eyes. "I never left you, you never left me, so we shouldn't leave him, yeah?"

He sighed. "He loves you."

"No he doesn't." She said firmly. "He loves the Rose Tyler I was six years ago, not the one I am now." She reached up, kissing him chastely. "No one, not even a copy of you, could ever replace you. Those words you always say to me? I feel the same. He has your body, but he doesn't have your soul."

Something nudged her mind, and the Doctor seemed to feel it as well. Looking down at the jumpseat, she saw a neat, red square of folded cloth.

"No time like the present." The Doctor said, getting Rose's attention and smiling wide at her.

"And the Earth has been returned!" The Meta Crisis announced, startling them both by his proximity to them. The rest of those aboard the TARDIS clapped and whooped with joy, hugging one another.

The Doctor stepped away from Rose, making some adjustments on the coordinate panel.

"How long did it take?" Meta Crisis asked her quietly as the Doctor moved around the console, doing his solo dance among the celebrators. "How long before I stopped running from you?"

Rose smiled weakly. "Not long." She said. "But we were always running together."

His lips twitched up but it didn't stick.

The Doctor flipped a switch, looked at the Time Rotor, than caught Rose's eye with a smile.

The TARDIS landed.

"Alright, everyone, outside. Jackie, Mickey, stay in the shadows, please." The Doctor instructed, and everyone began to file outside. He turned, collected the red cloth off the jumpseat, then waved Rose through as well.

Once outside on the cool, wet night, she looked around to see that they were in the alley near the estates where he returned to her and told her the TARDIS traveled through time. Everyone looked around in confusion, oddly forming a semi-circle around the TARDIS, facing the doors.

"We're at the estate." Jackie asked incredulously, rubbing her arms against the chill.

"March 5th, 2005. A half an hour ago, Rose came running into my TARDIS, and we never looked back." The Doctor said as he positioned himself and Rose to stand facing each other in front of the doors of the magnificent ship that hummed with happy excitement. "Of all the times and places I could have chosen to do this, I could think of no better one than right here. Where it all started."

"Do what?" Martha asked as Jack, Donna, Tim, and Jenny realized what was about to happen with gasps and chuckles.

The Doctor grinned manically, and Rose smiled his favorite grin in return, tongue in the corner of her mouth before he said. "I'm going to marry Rose Tyler." He said, reaching out and taking her left hand. He laid one end of the cloth in her hand. "Now, it's been, oh, quite a few centuries since I've seen one of these done, and while I could go into the library and dust off one of the tombs in there, I think doing the important bits is good enough. We don't need the long speeches, right?" He asked as Rose shook her head, already well in agreement.

"Wait a minute, what do you bloody mean you're marrying my daughter?" Jackie asked with no bite to her words, eyes wide as she looked Rose over. "She's not properly dressed, there isn't even a priest. How can you be marrying her?"

"It's a Gallifreyan wedding, Mum." Rose clarified. "A marriage in the way of the Doctor's people. A solid bond that will last 'til the day we die."

"That's all well and good, but what about the way of your people?" She protested, hands on her hips as she glared daggers at the Doctor.

"Well he gave me a ring," Rose replied weakly, worrying her lip with her teeth.

"Any bloke can give you a ring. I better be hearing some vows or something of the like coming out of your mouth." She pointed to the Doctor who looked at her wide eyed. "She's marrying you in a dank alley smelling like smoke. She ain't even wearing white. Best be doing a hell of a lot more than your alien version of gettin' hitched and promising a hologram of her mother that you'll look after her."

"Okay," he nodded, turning back to Rose and meeting her eye, relaxing a little as she smiled back at him. "I can do that, Jackie, but I need one thing from you."

"What's that, then?" She asked, but Rose wasn't looking at her anymore, her eyes locked on to the brown ones before her.

"I need you to say 'I consent and gladly give.'" He replied.

"Well, I dunno about gladly." She retorted.

"Jackie," Mickey chided.

"Oh, alright, alright, fine. I consent and gladly give." She said, no menace or sarcasm in the words the Doctor asked to say.

"I consent and gladly give," The Meta Crisis said behind Rose, and she turned to see him leaning against the graffiti covered wall. He was looking at the Doctor. "I'm the closest thing you have to home right now. And considering … well, I consent. And gladly give." He said with resignation, and Rose smiled sympathetically before turning back to the Doctor.

He took a deep breath, taking the other end of the cloth in his left hand and wrapping it around it, and Rose copied the motion until their hands where clasped and bound together.

"Rose Tyler," He said, a nervous smile playing on his lips as he seemed to consider his words. "I have lived a very long life, had seen so many places and people, searching for something that would make me feel alive. That would thrill me. But I was also looking for acceptance, for a place that wouldn't look at me and see a problem or an oddity. I found that place with you at my side. After the war, I was damaged in every way possible, and didn't believe I was worthy of anything good, or brilliant. I certainly didn't think I was worthy of you. But you never left my side. You took a very broken man and you put him back together, piece by piece. You admired the imperfections, you polished the away all the dings and scratches, and in the end you've made me like new. I lost a home, but you gave me one in your arms. I lost a family, but you've helped me build a new one." He said, gesturing to those around them as his eyes began to glisten. "My love for you is not bound to a body, but a soul. It can not be changed or altered by anything except to grow stronger and more resilient. It is forever. But the truth is forever is not long enough. We could live for centuries or a few millenniums, I will never have enough time with you. This is the one adventure I never thought I'd get to have, and I never want it to end. I love you, Rose Tyler, and I am so, so glad I met you."

She took a deep breath, trying very heard not to cry as tears threatened to spill down her cheeks. "Doctor, I." She paused, trying to collect her thoughts. "I was a shop girl. I was going nowhere. Then I met you, and 's like my world exploded from black an' white to color. Everything became so much more vivid. I've said you've shown me a better way to live, and 's true. But 's much more than that. You showed me what true, unconditional, selfless love looks like. You loved me at my worst, my darkest, and you were patient with me while I clawed my way back to myself. You're my best mate, always will be. My lover, my love, my life. I've been with you to the end of the Universe and back and I would do it again. Good, bad, all of it. I'll take it all because you'll be there with me. My hand to hold, through better or worse. I'm never going to leave you." She smiled. "My Doctor."

Rose didn't think his grin could stretch any wider, but it did, and after a shuddering chuckle he leaned in. She closed her eyes, expecting him to kiss her, and gasped as she felt his lips against her ear. He whispered a long, beautiful sounding word in his language the made her heart constrict with pure joy. A tear slipped down her cheek as that word brought a quick flash of everything the Doctor had ever been, and ever would be, to her mind. His good, his bad, his whole life was there for the taking when she was ready. Every thought he ever had or would have was hers to hear if she so desired, and she understood that upon hearing that word it went both ways. That word gave her knowledge of him, her Doctor, and upon willingly hearing it and taking it into her soul she was giving him the same in kind. He gave her his deepest secret, and she would cherish it always.

He leaned back and she looked him in the eye. "Hello," She said.

"Hello," He replied. "You knew what that was?"

"Yeah," She said softly. "It's nice to meet you."

He chuckled. "And now that that's been said, there's only one thing to do."

"Which is?" Rose asked with a coy grin, already knowing the answer.

"Now, I kiss the bride." He said, clasping the hand wrapped with his tightly before leaning in and giving her as passionate a kiss as he could with the audience around them.

As her mind caught fire, blazing hot and wild with his name at the forefront, those in attendance clapped and applauded, hooted and hollered without having any idea that something much more intimate than a kiss was taking place. Two minds were entwining, a permanent link solidifying a bond that only seconds before had been on the cusp of completion. His beautiful, brilliant mind washed over hers and made a home there. He welcomed her into his with warmth, practically leading her by the metaphorical hand to the place where a thousand minds used to hum. She flooded every place she could before they broke their kiss and unwound their hands, giggling a little as she realized she could still feel him without a single bit of their skin touching.

"Now, my darling wife." He said gleefully, "let's get everyone back to where they belong, shall we?"

"Now, come on, Doc." Jack said with a whine. "You two just got hitched, we've got to have a party."

"As wonderful as that sounds, Jack," Rose looked to her mother, seeing the tears in Jackie's eyes as well as the resignation and understanding. "The cracks between Universes are closing. And someone needs to get back home."


	34. And then We Part Ways

The TARDIS landed once again, and Rose followed Jackie as she opened the doors. Beyond them was a parking lot to the Canary Wharf building in a Universe where Zepplins filled the sky.

"Mummy!" A little boy cried out, and Rose watched her mother's face light up as she crouched down and welcomed a small, strawberry blond boy into her arms. She picked him up, planting kisses all along his face, turning and looking past Rose as the doors to the TARDIS opened a little wider. "How much time do we have?" She asked that oh so familiar question.

"Five minutes, then we need to go." The Doctor said.

Jackie nodded, looking back to the boy in her arms as Pete came up and kissed her temple. "This is your sister, Rose." She said to the little boy. "Rose, meet your brother Tony." She said, turning the boy toward her.

Rose looked over her shoulder, seeing Jenny and Tim both standing in the doorway, the latter smiling cockily. "Told you." He said with a wink, and Rose shook her head before returning her attention to her brother.

She took his chubby little hand and smiled. "It's nice to meet you, Tony." She said warmly, making the little boy grin. She looked past him. "Hello, Pete."

"Hello, Rose," He said, stepping around and taking her by surprise as he hugged her. "It's good to see you," he said with sincerity. He then looked to the Doctor. "You're a hard man to find." He said, offering him is hand for a shake.

"He's our son-in-law now." Jackie said as Pete and the Doctor connected, and Rose felt the cold fear of the Doctor in her mind. "Just got married they did, though not a proper human wedding. And they've got a daughter, too." She craned her head. "Come on out and meet your granddad and Uncle, Sweetheart." She called, and Rose tried not to smirk too badly when Jenny stepped out and Pete's jaw went slack.

"Hello, Granddad." She said with an eager grin in much the same way she once greeted her father.

"Hi." Pete said. "You're … but …."

"Alien," Jackie waved it off. "Didn't get the explanation, didn't want to, I just know she's our granddaughter and she looks more Tyler than Time Lord."

"You know," Tim said, "This is literally the only time you are all going to be together. Anyone have a camera or something?"

In perfect sync, Rose and Jack produced their phones.

"Right." Tim said, stepping out and allowing Donna to do the same. She took Jackie's phone as Tim took Rose's, and both of them gestured this way and that for the two families to stand together. After two different shudders sounded, they stepped apart, Rose and Jackie collecting their devices.

"We don't have much more time." The Doctor said, his regret coming through to Rose. She nodded, then stepped forward and hugged her Mum tight after she handed Tony off to Pete.

"You're gonna out live all of us by a long time, aren't you?" She asked Rose quietly.

"Never gonna forget you though." Rose replied.

"Better not." Jackie said, leaning back and looking at Rose with tears spilling down her cheeks. She wiped away the ones falling down Rose's, smiling. "I love you so much."

Rose nodded. "Love you too." She looked at Tony, taking his hand. "You're gonna forget ever meeting me, but I hope you do great things. Brilliant things. See the stars, travel, live a fantastic life. You can do that, yeah?" She asked the toddler, knowing the 'yeah' was just the normal response he would give but didn't care. "Take care of Mum, yeah?" She said to Pete.

"Always." He promised.

"Bye, Love." Jackie said as she hugged the Doctor, moving on to Jenny. "And I'm glad I got to meet you."

"We have to go," The Doctor said gently, hand on Jenny's back. She nodded, stepping away from her grandmother and following Tim and Donna back inside the TARDIS.

The Doctor put his arm around Rose, and she looked over her shoulder one last time at her Mum, Pete, and Tony. Her family. Her other family now, she supposed. She waved before shutting the door, thankful that the Meta Crisis already had them back in the Vortex.

It wasn't until the TARDIS calmed down after leaving the other Universe did she realize who they didn't leave behind.

She whirled around, finding Mickey a few feet away with his hands in his pockets, giving a shrug. "Nothing left for me over there. Gram's gone now. Passed away, nice and peaceful. At least this way I may get to see you from time to time, start a new life, give Jake the chance to start one too." The TARDIS landed with a shudder, and he glanced over his shoulder. "Who knows, maybe Captain Cheesecake will have a spot for me."

"You want one, it's yours." Jack said as he came up beside him. Rose opened the TARDIS doors, stepping out, letting the two men do the same. Jack stopped, whirling around and looking to Rose. "And don't you dare think for one second you and the Doctor are getting away without having a party of some kind."

The Doctor came up beside Rose, putting his arm around her shoulders. "Maybe after the honeymoon trip."

"So we'll see you in, what, a century?" Jack asked.

The Doctor considered. "For us maybe. For you it may only be a few hours. Give you time to head back to the hub, ask Ianto and Gwen if they want to come out."

"Tell Gwen to bring Rhys, too." Rose offered.

"Maybe," Jack said, looking over at the TARDIS. "This your stop too, little lady?" he asked.

Martha came up to him with a smile. "Can't see why not." She said with a shrug. "We are in London, aren't we?"

"There abouts." The Doctor said with a smirk.

"As long as it's not Aberdeen." Sarah Jane teased as she stepped outside.

"Well, we best be off if there's a party to get ready for."

"Martha," The Doctor stopped any of them moving. "Get rid of that Osterhagen thing. Save the world more than once."

"Consider it done." She said with a nod, letting Jack lead her and Mickey away.

Sarah Jane shook her head, smiling as she watched them go off.

"For as long as I've known you, you've always seemed like such a lonely man." She said. "But here you are: a wife, a daughter, and one of the biggest extended family's on Earth."

"So does that mean we're welcome to come visit, Aunt Sarah Jane?" Rose teased, tongue between her teeth as Sarah Jane laughed.

"Monday night dinner, since I know the Doctor doesn't do Sundays." She replied in kind. "And you'll have to meet Luke."

"What is the story behind Luke?" She asked, crossing her arms.

"A long one," Sarah Jane replied. "But he's only fourteen so I need to go. I'll see you later." She said, giving them each a quick hug before darting off in a different direction than the others.

"That it for our London drop offs?" Rose asked the Doctor, and she noted his eyes going dark as a wave of depression came over him. He looked back at her, a twitch of his lips upward. "Almost." He said, and Rose could sense exactly what was about to happen as they re-entered the TARDIS.

Rose spotted Tim leaning against the rail next to the jumpseat where Jenny was perched, eyes cast down with heartbreak behind them. Jenny hadn't seemed to notice, was chatting away with the Meta Crisis and her Aunt Donna without any hint at feeling the sudden change in mood.

Rose could feel the Doctor's hearts aching before he reached out and grabbed her hand, holding it tightly. She'd been trying to comfort him, but after so long of needing the physical to send those wave lengths it was easier for her focus when they were connected.

They moved around the console, and she caught the resigned look in the Meta Crisis's eyes as he looked up.

"I thought you two could drop us four off on the planet Felspoon before you guys go honeymooning across time and space ." Donna suggested as she fiddled with the console. "What a good name, Felspoon. Apparently, it's got mountains that sway in the breeze. Mountains that move, can you imagine?"

"And how do you know that?" The Meta Crisis asked.

"Because it's in your head." Donna replied. "And it's in your head 'cause it's in his head. And I got your mind so it's in mine!" She said giddily.

"But it's not in my head," The Meta Crisis said with a shake of his head. "I don't have that knowledge."

"Oh," Donna said, surprised at first and then she smiled. "I know somethings you don't! Look at that."

"And how does that feel?" The Doctor asked evenly despite the heaviness of his hearts that was so strong Rose felt it in her own.

"Brilliant." Donna replied. "Fantastic, Molto Bene! Great big universe packed into my brain. You know you could fix the chameleon circuit if you just tried hotbinding the fragment-links and superseding the binary, binary, binary …." She went on repeat that one word nearly a dozen times before she took a deep breath, "I'm fine!" She said, though Rose noticed the joy behind her eyes had vanished and was replaced by fear. "Nah, never mind Felspoon. Good ol Earth, but maybe the past. Know who I'd like to meet? Charlie Chaplin? What do you say, kids? Charlie Chaplin? Charlie Chester, Charlie Brown, no, he's fiction, friction, fiction, fixing, mixing," She took a deep breath and leaned against the console, hands on her head.

"Aunt Donna?" Jenny asked standing slowly.

"It's okay, Love. Stay there." The Doctor said while his voice did not sound quite so reassuring.

"Do you know what's happening?" The Meta Crisis asked, kneeling down to be eye level with Donna as Tim put an arm around Jenny and kept her back.

"Yeah," Donna replied.

"There's never been a human/Time Lord meta crisis before now, and you know why." The Doctor said, kneeling down on the other side of Donna.

"Because they're can't be." She said, bowing her head so she didn't have to look at either of them. "I want to stay."

"This will kill you." The Doctor said, gentle but firm.

"What about the Chameleon arc?" Rose suggested, seeing the fear in Donna's eyes as she looked up at the Doctor.

"I don't know if it would work. And I can't," he shook his head. "I can't subject her to our life, watching everyone she loves leave."

"Please try, pie, lie, dry." Donna begged.

"I can fix this." The Meta-crisis said, and everyone turned to look at him as he met Rose's eye as if she was the only one he would speak to. "I can take away the Time Lord."

"How?" Rose asked, see his brown eyes go sad.

"I'm still within the first fifteen hours of my formation, and so is she. Now that the Time Lord aspect of Donna has been activated I can take it back. I can take on the knowledge that she received." He explained. "It was, after all, a two -way meta crisis."

"But you won't survive." The Doctor said firmly.

The Meta-crisis laughed without humor. "I wasn't going to survive anyway," He said as if it was information everyone should have already known. "My smaller mind would have burned eventually. And what's more is I'm not even a proper Meta-crisis. Born of a little bit of Time Lord DNA, and an elixir. I had a six months, maybe a year. Virtually nothing to a Time Lord."

"It's still something." The Doctor reminded.

"Except I'd have never been happy. I committed genocide within hours of being born, doing something that was against our name for the second time in our life, then I'd have had to live my short existence witnessing how you have everything I ever dreamed of. So please, let me die giving someone their life." He didn't ask, gently turning Donna's head toward him. "Thank you for what you gave me, even if it was only brief." He said before he put his fingers on Donna's temple, and they both closed their eyes.

As the pain in Donna's face began to ease, the more contorted the Meta-crisis's face became. He breathing grew more heavy and ragged as Donna's eased and calmed. Sweat broke out over his forehead, and as a peaceful looking Donna fell back into the Doctor's arms, the Meta Crisis screamed in agony and clutched his head.

Rose got down and took him in her arms, held him tight as he whimpered. "Rose." He said gripping her sweater as tight as he could. "Rose, Rose, Rose."

"I'm here, I'm here, you're not alone." She said, feeling the Doctor's mind connect to someone else. She glanced up, seeing his eyes were closed and his fingers pressed to Donna's temples.

"It hurts, my head is killing me." The Meta Crisis cried.

"Shh," She soothed him, brushing her fingers over his hair.

"I," He choked out, but he had too much trouble saying much more. A couple of quick breaths later, and he stopped. Everything about him stilled, and his hands fell limply to his lap.

Rose let the tear fall down her cheek, her heart breaking for a man who looked like the Doctor. She continued to hold him as the Doctor finished with Donna.

When he opened his eyes, she felt the pang of grief he had at the sight of his Meta-crisis limp against her, then the sadness he got when he looked to Donna.

"He took all the Time Lord knowledge out of her, everything she shouldn't have known before that electric strike. Before it became too much for him, he shrunk her mind back down, but … but it's like a balloon. You can blow it up, expand it, then let the air out and it deflates back to the size it started as. But one puff of air and it starts expanding again."

"She can't stay with us," Rose surmised, and the Doctor shook his head.

"One new thing, one innocent encounter with an alien, could set her mind expanding. And it's not like it was with you, Rose, it won't be slow. It will be quick, too quick for her to keep up with, and it will make her mind burn like his did. I've blurred some of the memories she had, put some shields in place as a precaution, but her days in the TARDIS are over." He said, and Rose closed her eyes against the flood of emotions they both felt.

"Two will be born, one will die, one will be lost." Rose repeated the prophecy Evelina had said in Pompeii all that time ago. "Our pack grew but didn't stay that way. Our children of Time went home."

"Not all of them," He said, glancing to where Jenny and Tim were likely standing. "And not for good." He stood up, picking up Donna in the process and setting her on the jumpseat. He then came back and picked up the Meta-crisis, bringing him somewhere deep in the TARDIS.

"Mum," Jenny said quietly, and Rose felt her daughter's hand on her shoulder. "Are you alright?"

Rose nodded, sniffing. "Yeah, I am." She turned, giving Jenny and Tim a watery smile. "Just a lot, and I'm feeling what your father is, too."

"What's he going to do with the Meta Crisis?" Tim asked.

"I imagine there will be a pyre. Time Lord DNA and all."

"What can I do? Anything?" He asked.

Rose shook her head as the Doctor returned.

"We'll bring Donna home first, then we'll take care of him." He said as he went to the console inputting the coordinates.

Rose moved to his side as he came to a stop. "You're closing yourself off. Haven't even been bonded for an hour."

He met her eye. "I don't want you to feel what I am." He said calmly.

"I'm willing to." She said as she caressed his cheek.

"I know," he replied as the TARDIS landed. He picked up Donna. "Come with me?" He asked when he didn't have to, and Rose answered by running ahead and opening the TARDIS doors for him. They moved as one toward the Noble's front door, and Rose rang the bell as the Doctor held Donna tightly.

Wilf opened the door all smiles until he saw Donna in the Doctor's arms.

* * *

 

They sat in the living room, Rose clutching the Doctor's hand as he explained to Wilf and Sylvia what happened. She focused on Wilf the most, seeing his expressions change with each new fact until the end of the tale when it settled on sad.

"All those wonderful things she saw." He spoke once the Doctor finished, the first words said by anyone by the Time Lord since the four of them sat down. "She won't remember?"

"She'll know she traveled, know she'd been to a lot of places and seen and saved so many people, but it will be like a dream. I put in the suggestion that what had happened to her the first time we met had made traveling problematic for her. She'll remember the pain in her mind and think it a reaction. She'll believe that she chose to come home."

"But she was with you when the Earth…." Sylvia started to protest, but the Doctor shook her head.

"It'll just be a story. One of those Donna Noble stories where she missed it all again."

"She'll think she asked to come home first." Rose said, hearing the Doctor's words in her mind, giving them voice and feeling his appreciation that she could. "She'll think her headaches became too much, and she was asleep in bed before the whole thing happened. And when she wakes up, she'll have simply missed it."

There was a lull of silence where no one looked at each other.

"She was better with you." Wilf said, simply and solemnly stating a fact.

"Don't say that," Sylvia snapped.

"Remember what Rose's mother said to you?" Wilf asked her. "You need to accept it, Sweetheart. Donna was better with them, more alive."

Another lull of silence as Sylvia seemed to digest this thought, off in her own mind.

"There are worlds out there, safe in the sky because of Donna." The Doctor said. "There are people living in the light, and singing songs of her. The will never forget her, even if she doesn't quite remember them. Because for one shining moment, she was …. She was the most important woman in whole, wide universe." The Doctor said, and his choice of words made Rose understand his pause.

Someone in the TARDIS always knew. And when Caan taunted about one of them dying, Tim had looked at the Meta Crisis and Donna because he knew for sure what was going to happen. He'd seen it and knew there was nothing he could do.

"One moment?" Sylvia said. "Donna still is, she's my daughter."

"Then you should tell her that once in a while." The Doctor snapped.

A loud yawn cut through the tension and everyone looked up as Donna walked into the room. "Blimey, what did you give me for that headache that made me conk like that? Passed right out on my bed, I was." She stopped, and Rose looked up and tried not to cry out in relief when she saw the smile on Donna's face. "You two should be off to Disney World for that honeymoon you promised her, there, Doctor." She said.

The relief from the Doctor rolled over Rose as well as he stood and smiled.

"Right you are, Donna Noble. We'll be back in a day or two to check on you, make sure that headache of yours doesn't come back now that you're home."

"And you'll be by once a month like you promised. Proper sit down, you and the Missus, and Jenny too if you can." Donna half growled, her threat clear as her smile dropped.

"Of course." Rose said.

"We'll be off, then. Leave you to rest up." The Doctor said.

Donna nodded, about to say something when her phone chirped. She pulled it out of her jacket pocket. "My phone's gone mad! 32 texts. Veena's gone barmy, she's saying planets in the sky. Mad, really. Pretty sure I would have remembered that." She rolled her eyes, then looked between the Doctor and Rose. "Well go on, then. Honeymoon." She waved them off and ventured into the kitchen.

"As Donna said," Sylvia said, a cold tone to her voice that earned a glare from Wilf. "Go on."

Rose bit her tongue as the Doctor pulled her hand, leading her to the door. He opened it, glancing behind him and letting go before stepping outside and stopping on the step.

"You will come back for her, yeah?" Wilf asked, as Rose stepped outside. "'Cause she's already lost so much, and she waited so long to find you. If you were to just never come back."

"We'll come back." Rose nodded. "Might be a long time for us, but we will come back to see her."

Wilf nodded, seeming satisfied with that answer. "Just don't forget her."

"Never could." The Doctor said sincerely, taking a deep breath and walking away from the door.

Rose waved at Wilf over her shoulder, the Doctor doing the same as an after thought, and the two headed back inside the TARDIS.

* * *

 

After they had been gone a few minutes, Tim turned to Jenny, seeing her staring at the spot where the Meta Crisis had passed on. He took a deep breath, turned toward the blonde.

"How are you doing, Goldie Locks?" He asked, taking a couple steps closer, resting a hand on the edge of the control panel.

She snorted. "I don't know what to think." She said honestly. "We go from saving the Universe from creatures I've only ever heard of in stories, to watching my parents get married and saying goodbye to a Grandmother I had only met and will never see again, as well as a grandfather and an uncle. And then the man who looked like my father died saving an aunt who had to forget most everything she saw while traveling. I know I'm not that old, realistically, but it's like I'm learning for the first time how truly unfair life is." Jenny's hands clenched into fists.

"I know," Tim said as soothing as he could.

"He was created in battle, like me, and I know he wasn't my dad, but for a moment I felt like maybe I'd have someone who would understand that part of me."

"I get it." Tim nodded.

"How can you act so unaffected by all this?" Jenny demanded, hitting Tim's chest with one of her fists. "How aren't you reeling in one way or another?"

He was, deep inside. The whole thing was messed up, terrible, and he knew it was coming the whole time.

"Because I saw it all coming." Tim admitted to Jenny. "From the moment I met Donna I saw all this happening."

"And you didn't say anything?" Jenny's voice went shrill a she pounded his chest again with both hands. "You could have stopped all of it. You could have … and then all the bad wouldn't have happened!"

"I couldn't say anything, Jenny." Tim grabbed her wrists, held them firm as she struggled to either get free or hit him again. "Just 'cause I know it's coming doesn't mean I can interfere. Everything had to happen exactly as it did, or none of us, the Universe, would be here. You may not want to acknowledge this, but things could have been far, far worse for Donna if things had been different."

She slapped him.

He wasn't sure how she managed to get her hand free without him noticing until her palm was firmly smacking his cheek.

He didn't flinch, even though it stung. Instead, Tim stood firm and allowed her to do it again as the tears clouded her eyes.

"It's okay." He said after the second hit. "Let it out, go on." He braced himself for the third, and anticipated a fourth.

He didn't expect for Jenny to fling herself forward and kiss him.

He stumbled back, letting go of her other wrist and hesitated with his hands to the side as his lips involuntarily moved with Jenny's and his eyes fell shut. She grabbed the lapels of his jacket and forced him closer, and Tim went with it.

He wouldn't admit to not seeing this being a possibility, nor that he enjoyed it. He was kissing an alien, really kissing her now that his hands found a place on her waist.

"You're better than my first kiss, I'll give you that." Jenny said when she paused to take a breath.

"Always good to hear," Tim said on the next pause, allowing all the confusion he had over everything come through in his voice before Jenny was back on him.

When she finally stepped back he was gasping for air, his lungs were burning and his mind was thoroughly confused. He clearly did not understand grief as well as he thought.

"I was upset." She said.

"I know." He panted.

"Say that again, and I'm going to go back to slapping you." She warned as she let go of his jacket.

"Yeah, that seems fair." He said, letting out a huff of air after she stepped away, pushing his hair out of his face.

"I'm staying on board for a bit, by the way." Jenny added as she collapsed on the jumpseat.

"Yeah, makes sense. Make this place as awkward as possible." He said as he moved slowly to stand by the ramp.

He jumped when the doors opened, willing his heart to slow as Stormboy and Wolf Girl came up and silently worked as a team to put the TARDIS into the Vortex.

"One more stop," The Doctor sighed, the day wearing on him. "Then we're dropping you two off somewhere for a couple hours."

"What?" Tim and Jenny protested as one.

The Doctor looked up in surprise, looking between the two of them and then to Rose. "We aren't taking you with us on our honeymoon, sorry." He said unapologetically.

"Is there a problem with the two of you waiting together?" Rose asked, first to her daughter and then to Tim. "You didn't want to go home quite yet, did you?"

"Umm…." He answered as the TARDIS landed and the Doctor went into the corridor.

"We're going to have the pyre for the Meta Crisis." Rose said. "Then admittedly we'll probably need some time to … to just breathe after the day. But it would be best if we drop you two off sooner than later. If you don't want it to be together..."

"It's okay, Mum." Jenny said. "I think we can handle a few hours on our own."

Tim kept his mouth shut, not sure that was actually going to be true.

The Doctor reemerged, carrying what Tim would have guessed was the Meta Crisis, though it looked more like a mummy.

He said nothing as he and Rose moved to the doors and stepped outside, and Tim risked a glance up to Jenny.

"Come on," He said kindly, catching the tears rising in her reddening eyes before she blinked them away. "Let's go pay our respects." He extended his hand toward her, and after she gave a shuddering breath she came over and took it, allowing him to grip her hand and lead her out the TARDIS.

* * *

 

Rose and the Doctor laid in bed, holding on to each other, staring at the ceiling of the quiet TARDIS. Both were still clothed, the sheets beneath them, a wedding night Rose would not have expected from them.

"You marked down the date and time and planet?" The Doctor asked.

"Yeah," Rose said. "We can take all the time we need, we'll get them when we're ready."

"It was so strange," The Doctor said after a bit of silence. "Wrapping up someone who looked like me, feeling no … attachment. He had a Time Lord brain but I didn't feel him. I don't think he was quite on the same wavelength as me."

"Are you alright?" Rose asked, even though she could feel the subtle numbness he did.

"I'm always alright." He countered as he always had. "We're alright." He added after another pause. "This is just a blip. Donna lived, she got to remember us, we can keep her in our lives. We'll go on, have adventures together, keep Jenny and Tim with us as long as we can, and we'll move on."

"Yeah." Rose agreed.

She felt him caress her mind with his, glancing up to see him smiling at her. "Bond mate." He said reverently.

"Husband," She smiled around the word.

"Moving forward." He said with a slight nod,and a will to do just that she was sure he wouldn't have if he was alone.

"Together." She agreed, leaning in and kissing him softly before tucking her head beneath his chin.

There would be much to move forward from, much to do and see, and they would. But first, Rose intended to sleep.

And with the presence of the Doctor in her mind, she drifted off blissfully.


	35. The End of Time

Time passes for the Time Lord, and he counts his lucky stars each and every moment. For he has seen the time lines, he knows that there were too many points where he could have lost his love, his Bad Wolf.

But those have passed.

He can see their time lines entwined, stretched out for eternity, and has from the moment of their union.

They travel the stars, with friends and family as well as without, and loose track of the years but for milestones that should be noted. A hundredth birthday, a hundred years of traveling, a hundred years of marriage.

But the Time Lord knows the end is near for the man he is now, can feel it on the wind, has heard it voiced by friend and stranger alike. Still he carries on, hoping to delay, wondering if there will be another hundred years for the man he is now to spend with the woman he loves ….

"Don't forget we still need to go back and have dinner with Sarah Jane and Luke." Rose reminded the Doctor as she lounged on the jumpseat, enjoying their quiet moment while he did maintenance and she read. "We last saw her five years ago."

"I thought we had to go back for Mickey and Martha?" He replied from under the console.

"That too, but it's only been a couple years since we've seen them," Rose replied, turning the page of her novel.

"Blimey, how long has it been since we've visited Jenny, then?" He said, resurfacing from beneath the console with a streak of grease on his cheek. He didn't have on his blazer or tie, his sleeves were rolled up, and despite the decades of seeing him naked he still seemed more so like this than he had in the actual state.

For the first decade after they'd taken a couple weeks to recover from the loss of Donna and the Meta Crisis, they'd been in one of two states: Fully dressed or naked. The TARDIS conveniently took that ten year span to never need to be tinkered with, bringing them only where they wanted to go and never deviating. It was after that that they returned for their daughter and Tim, both finding it overly comical that they were greeted with such warmth and enthusiasm when to them it had only been a couple days.

"For us? It's only been a few months," Rose said, remembering how little they were willing to part with her after that decade long honeymoon. "But she's informed me that our frequency of visits is prohibiting her from making friends aside from River."

"We don't see her that often," The Doctor huffed, reaching to straighten the tie that wasn't there and only fiddled with his collar.

"We don't," Rose hummed in agreement. "But to avoid paradoxes we've landed nearly ever other day for her first year of school. And we can't keep pulling her out of school for years on end or she'll never remember anything."

"She never complains about that," The Doctor said firmly, pointing the tool in his hand at Rose for emphasis. "Especially when we happen to pick up Tim for a bit. See, she has a friend other than River." He said, returning his attention to the console.

Rose merely peered at him over her book.

For a Time Lord with a big Time Lord brain, he was utterly clueless when it came to the obvious. Especially when it involved their daughter and her huge infatuation for their part-time companion.

Her phone rang, and she stood from her seat and walked to where it rested on the console. "Donna." She said, and the Doctor immediately resurfaced with a look of worry as he had every time they would get a call from her over the last century. "Hi, stranger." Rose smiled as she answered her phone.

"Get your ass to Earth, Blondie, and make sure Spaceman's with you. I'm getting married!"

* * *

 

Donna Noble had introduced Shawn, a kind, quiet man who she said she'd met through Wilf and had not stopped talking about him from the moment they walked into the house. Sylvia, as she always did, made a point to ignore both the guests by suddenly becoming insanely busy with anything and everything that would keep her away. Wilf would sit nearby, smiling between his granddaughter and her two best friends in the universe.

But the Doctor noted that Wilf was not quite so sincere in his normal repertoire, his grin thin and weak, his eyes gazing off as if he was thinking of something else entirely.

And perhaps that was probably because now they were talking about wedding colors. Why did that even matter, wedding colors? What was the point? You stand in an alley, say a few words in front of some friends, and be done with it. Humans and their insane, pointless, wonderful rituals. Needing to ensure that the dresses worn by those who support the bride match the ties of those who stand with the groom, as well as the cake, the napkins, the flowers, and anything else that could possible have a color.

Had Rose ever wanted any of this? She didn't look particular sad or wistful as she listened to Donna prattle on and on about nothing of great importance. She was giddy, he could feel it through their bond, happy for their friend. Stray thoughts of doing this with Jenny fluttered here and there, but why she thought Tim, a mere human (okay, fine, not mere. Pretty remarkable, honestly), should be the one marrying their daughter in her fantasy of the future. Why did it matter?

He sighed, smiling fondly at his bond mate. Wife, as he knew she preferred to be called, and he could at least stick to that since he wasn't going to wear a wedding ring unless absolutely necessary. He'd kept one in his pockets, engraved like Rose's, in case their dangerous adventures proved easier when a visible symbol of their union was seen. Only happened once. Well, twice, well there was that incident with Lady Christina de Souza. Flirty, that woman. Rose had been overseeing the bus extraction, making sure things were going well, reporting to him over their bond and he back to her. He and Christina had been flirting (at least that's what Rose said, though he claims it was merely conversing) in French as they walked the dessert when she asked him about his companion. A hand slipped into the pocket, ring put in place. "Oh, you mean my wife, Rose?" Didn't exactly stop her from giving him a kiss, but then again she kissed Rose too, so he wasn't sure what to think of that. Briefly considered introducing her to Jack then thought better of it.

A nudge disturbed his thoughts, and he glanced at Rose fully prepared to see a reprimanding glare because he thought of that adventure again when he realized she was actually paying attention to Donna. Now that he was looking at her, concentrating, he realized the mental signature that was bumping his mind wasn't hers, wasn't even human.

Ood Sigma.

And it sounded desperate.

"Sweetheart," he said, interrupting the conversation she was having with Donna, and by the look on their friend's face, the timing was rude. "I need to run out a moment." He smiled. "I'm being summoned."

Rose's brow knitted together in that really adorable way that hadn't gotten old at all. "Okay," She said out loud. "By who?" She asked as he waved to Donna and stepped outside.

"Ood Sigma." He replied as he glanced up and down the street as he crossed the road to the TARDIS. "He's calling me back to the Ood sphere. Not sure why."

"Be safe." She had said, adding his real name and causing him to pause half way opening the doors of the TARDIS. She didn't use it all the time, mostly as the ultimate term of endearment. When they parted ways for a bit like they were now, when he had given her a great enough scare or was overwhelmed by him in some way, when they …. Yeah, he liked that one best.

He took the TARDIS to the Ood sphere, trying not to dwell, recalling something that happened about a decade or so ago now.

A trip to Mars with Tim and Jenny in tow that had been quickly abandoned when he recalled the fixed point about to happen and wanted to get as far away from it as possible. He hated leaving them to die, but it had to be done.

"Sometimes death has to happen, Stormboy." Tim had said as he sat by the Doctor's feet while the Time Lord did maintenance to distract his mind. Wife and daughter were deep in the TARDIS somewhere, and it was just the two of them as he closed his bond off to Rose so they could each have privacy. "Sometimes … you gotta die so someone else will live." Tim had said, and the way he said it got the Doctor's attention. He'd sat up, looking his young companion in the eye and understood what he was saying. "Like a guy might be just trying to help, and he gets in the way."

"When?" The Doctor asked sharply.

Tim shrugged. "Dunno. I see aliens with spaghetti mouths, an old dude, Sax … Sacrifice, and then it's like I 'hear' four knocks." Tim had shrugged. "It's all I know. Sorry."

The Doctor nodded. "Don't tell Rose." He had said, sealing the memory of what Tim said away from her. It was wrong, but she had already heard what Carmen had said, and it left her on edge for a few years after that.

Blocking the memory from Rose had the added bonus of making him forget for the most part as well, but the way that Tim described the aliens in his vision made the Doctor think Ood against his better judgment. And here he was, heading to the Oodsphere, and he wasn't sure why.

He stepped outside in the snow, already missing the feel of Rose's mind brushing strongly against his as he looked at Ood Sigma waiting for him a few feet away.

"Ood Sigma!" He said with a wide grin. "Been a while, hasn't it? Blimey, nearly a hundred years from my end. You said my song was changing, and oh did it ever. Got married, did a few times actually, but only one really counted. Don't worry, same woman. Well, same woman and once there was a third party involved but he was quickly informed it meant nothing. Good thing we're good mates, didn't stop him from sulking. His boyfriend wasn't amused by the story. Anyway, you don't need to hear any of that. So, why the summons?"

"You will come with me." Ood Sigma said in that strangely polite tone.

"Straight to the point then," The Doctor said.

"We'd been trying to reach you, we have only just succeeded."

"Ah," he said as she followed Ood Sigma through the snow to a city carved in the stone and ice. "Magnificent!" The Doctor smiled broadly, nudging Ood Sigma who didn't seem pleased. But then again, when did an Ood ever look pleased with anything? "Oh, come on. That is splendid. You've achieved all this in how long?"

"One hundred years." Ood Sigma replied.

"Really?" The Doctor asked, taken aback. "Huh, not often I actually reunite with someone linearly. Wait until I tell Rose, she's going to be so … wait. One hundred years? One century?" he asked, and Ood Sigma nodded once. "Well then we've got a problem. 'Cause all this is way too fast. Not just the city, I mean your ability to call me. Reaching all the way back to the 21st century. Something's accelerating your species.

"And the Mind of the Ood is troubled." Ood Sigma agreed.

"Why, what's happening?"

"Every night, Doctor. Every night we have bad dreams."

* * *

 

"Thought I'd bring you out a cuppa." Rose said as she came up to Wilf who sat in a chair by himself in the living room. She'd been in the kitchen with Donna and her friends, women who Rose felt entirely out of touch with. While they were all, for the most part, single or divorced, Rose had been married for so long she'd forgotten what it was like to be unattached. And because she still looked like she was in her early twenties, having the same look-out of marriage as someone who'd been in it for fifty-years or more wasn't gaining her any brownie points.

So when a big pot of tea had been made, Rose used the offer of a cup to Wilf as a means of escape, especially after she thought she heard him chattering to himself not that long before.

"Thank you, Dear." He said with a smile, and when a loud, bistros laugh ran out from the kitchen, it turned sympathetic. He then gestured to the Sofa with his head.

Rose accepted to offer of a seat.

"I'm too old for that nonsense." She said with a long glance to the kitchen before smiling at Wilf.

He scoffed. "Not even older than Donna." He said as he took a sip.

Rose smirked. "I'm about four times Donna's age." She said, taking a sip of her own tea.

He laughed, shaking his head. Then he stiffened, stared at the television like he'd seen a ghost. Rose glanced over, but didn't see anything except an advertisement for Christmas things.

"Oh," She said, perking up a bit. "Didn't realize when we landed. What's the date?" She asked Wilf.

"December twenty-fourth." He replied, and Rose paled. "Oh, is that not good?"

"2010?" She asked, and he nodded. "Well, so long as I don't go anywhere near North America, should be fine." She took another sip of tea. "But I didn't bring anything. Not for Donna, or for you. That's why all this is taking place here, innit? She's here for the holidays. Asked her friends to come by so we could all chat as a wedding party."

"She called you." He reminded her. "Didn't she give you the date?"

Rose shrugged. "Gave that bit to the Doctor." She replied.

"Ah," Was all Wilf had a chance to say before the front door of the Noble house was thrown open, shut hard, and the Doctor walked in with what was quite obviously a put on smile.

Rose hadn't realized he'd returned from the Ood Sphere.

"Rose, Sweetheart," he said, sounding almost relieved, trying to put his hands in his pockets with a nonchalance that didn't seem honest.

"What happened?" She asked, sensing the walls he'd put up, which only made her worry more.

"Something's come up." He said slowly. "Someone we'd have never have expected to see again." He added, but that had been so many people it wasn't really much of a hint.

"I can leave the room if you two need to have a conversation," Wilf offered, throwing a thumb over his shoulder.

"No, it's alright, you don't need to do that." Rose reassured, looking from him to the Doctor then gestured for him to sit beside her.

He nodded once, glancing in the kitchen before coming around and sitting beside her. He put his arm around the back of the sofa, playing with the curl to Rose's hair. It seemed to calm him, she noticed. The way that he'd tug until it was nearly straight then watched as he let it go and it bounced back. He did this a couple times before he slowly let what he saw and heard at the Ood Sphere trickle through.

The Master, Wilf, a couple Rose didn't know but thought she recognized at least half of, and the Master's wife.

"Lucy," The Doctor reminded her before showing her more. How he showed the elder Ood what had happened, and then the elder in turn showing him someone, a woman, plucking the Master's ring from pyre after they left. How the Ood warned them that the Master was part of a greater plot when he tried to flee, how when he did he spotted his fellow Time Lord. Half formed, burning his own life energy away, leaping into the air like a super hero. He was guilty as he showed her that he closed himself off to her before he chased after him.

The Master had strange powers now, adding more to the superhero like behavior he showed with the whole jumping bit. He had missed twice before striking the Doctor in the chest with some kind of energy from his hands. She got a inkling of how much it had hurt, but she showed her how they both collapsed.

Through their recovery that had spoken like they were still Theta and Koschei, the old friends they had been so long ago. Rose had felt the same spark of affection the Doctor had in their moment of reconnection before it turned more bitter. And even still, it was there, always would be, deep inside. Then the Master had shown the Doctor the noise in his mind, and this time the Doctor heard it. Someone was calling to the Master, but before they could sort it out, the Master was taken, and the Doctor was knocked out while trying to stop him.

"How do you feel?" Rose asked him kindly.

"Alright. Headache's not too bad."

When Rose slapped the Doctor across the face, it startled Wilf, and even caused a but of commotion from the kitchen where Donna and the rest of her wedding party were chattering away.

"I deserved that," The Doctor said.

"What did you do?" Wilf asked, sounding baffled.

"Acted reckless." Rose bit out.

"Oh," Wilf said, failing to hide the smirk pulling at his lips and hiding it behind his mug.

"I wasn't about to stop and grab you when I already knew time was precious." The Doctor argued calmly. "And you saw, he wasn't really trying to hurt me."

Rose wasn't too sure about that, especially with the hint of nervousness and the worried glint in the Doctor's eye.

"So what do you intend to do now?" Rose asked the Doctor.

"You know what." He said, looking at her meaningfully. "And you know what I'm going to ask of you."

"And you know what I'm going to say to that."

"Must never be any mystery to your marriage if you always know what the other's gonna do." Wilf teased, and the Doctor and Rose both snickered. "Maybe you can solve this one for me." He said, setting his mug down and reaching for something under the side table. He pulled out a book, handing it over to the Doctor. "Donna got me this, thought I might like it but didn't know why." He stood up, said he'd be back, and went upstairs.

Rose felt the cold shock that hit the Doctor as he looked over the book.

"I knew I saw that face before." She said when she remembered spotting the book earlier.

"Good ol' Donna." The Doctor said affectionately despite his undercurrent of worry. He glanced up toward the kitchen just as Donna laughed. "She doesn't remember much of her journey but there you have it, the part of her that was the Doctor-Donna still coming through."

Rose's heart stuttered, "Her mind, will it?"

"No," The Doctor shook his head. "No, I imagine it was something set in motion before she forgot. Like Bad Wolf, the DoctorDonna would have resonated in more ways than one." His affection faded, his eyes glancing down at the book. "But what does our Mister Naismith have to do with our old friend?" He said more to himself than anything.

"Perhaps you should go find out." Rose said softly, and the Doctor looked up in surprise. She didn't need to put her hand on his to speak to him, but it was still somewhat habitual even after all these decades. "If the Master is here, then there's alien activity. Donna needs someone here to shield her from it however possible."

"There are safe guards in place." The Doctor reminded her, and she grinned.

"I know, but I feel like, I dunno, like this is something you should do on your own." She said. "Or at least without me."

"Dad!" She heard Sylvia call out. "Where're you hiding? Donna's friends are about to leave soon, and if you think you can hide in there and watch the telly all day, you're mistaken. Come on, I need help in the kitchen and we all know Donna's useless."

"Oi," Donna cried out.

"How about you take Wilf with you?" Rose suggested, surprising both the men as she spotted Wilf half trying to hid behind the banister of the stairs as he came back down them.

"Rose, you know who we're dealing with. You know he's dangerous."

"Can't be any more dangerous than Sylvia in the kitchen with Donna around." Wilf countered, coming into the room as Sylvia gave another shout for him.

"Nothing says he has to leave the TARDIS." She reminded him.

The Doctor stood, going stiff as Sylvia stopped and stared at him.

"When did you come back?" She asked harshly.

"I was just leaving." He said, pointing toward the front door.

Wilf got up, hustling to follow the Doctor.

"You are not going with him." Sylvia said incredulously as Wilf slipped on his shoes and grabbed his jacket. An argument between father and daughter started up, fading as she chased after him while he followed the Doctor.

A moment later, Donna came out, looking baffled. "Didn't I just hear my Mum?" She asked.

"Yeah, she went outside with your Gramps." Rose said, not adding any more to it.

"Oh," Donna said, a little disappointed before perking up. "I left the pictures of my new dress in the glove compartment of my car, mind running out and getting them for me?" Donna asked as she produced a set of car keys from her pocket and handed them to Rose. "Was gonna ask Mum, but I don't know why. She wouldn't have done it anyway."

"Sure," Rose said, grabbing the keys and passing an irritated Sylvia on her way out the door.

She rounded over to Donna's car, heading to the passenger side while glancing to where the TARDIS would be. The Doctor closed off from her again, which didn't surprise her, she supposed. Not when she knew he'd be reckless and wouldn't want her to know of the pain or the close calls.

She dug through the glove compartment, having found the dress photos and smiling at how they were relatively the same style that Donna wore before but with a few changes to the details.

Rose was so focused on the images that she gasped as she turned and nearly collided with a woman in white standing in the Noble's driveway.

"It was wise of you to send Wilfred with the Doctor," She said. "You have done well to look after him, but it's a soldier he needs now, not a wolf."

Rose stared. "Didn't realize it was something that needed to happen."

"You saw time," The woman said. "All that is, was, and will be. You saw this, too. You knew what was to come and that is why your instincts are telling you to stay here."

"And Wilf had to go, because?"

"He is meant to take arms at the Doctor's side." She took a minute to really study Rose. "He may die."

Rose's stomach twisted, but she managed a smirk. "Hundred an' twenty-seven isn't a terrible age to live to." She said.

The woman seemed to peer into Rose's soul. "You have a romantic love for the Doctor stronger than I have ever seen." She said, partially in awe, but also factually.

Rose looked at her, really took her in. "And my daughter has your eyes." She said.

The woman smiled. "I bet she does."

Rose blinked, and the woman was gone.

* * *

 

He wasn't sure what to make of all this, but he knew he was right where he belonged. Before Rose, sweet heart that she was, brought him a cup of tea Wilf had been having a conversation with someone he didn't know. And she was on the telly. He'd heard of strange things like that happening on a street in London back in the day. Just whispered rumors not long before the Queen's coronation, but he didn't really believe it was anything more than silly superstition. Yet there was a woman on the telly, chatting away with him, telling him that the time would come for him to take arms, and to keep it all from the Doctor.

So now he stood inside the space ship box, casually moving the small, never used hand gun from his back pocket to his jacket, keeping it wrapped in the handkerchief he'd always had it in so it wouldn't appear quite so conspicuous.

The Doctor ran about the round thing in the middle, hardly paying him any mind as he nattered on about this and that, tracking and tracing, and saving the world, Wilf was sure.

The Doctor finally stopped, having spotted Wilf standing at the top of the ramp and simply gazing around. "Ah, right, yes. Bigger on the inside. Do you like it?" He asked.

Wilf figured he'd may as well be honest. "I thought it'd be cleaner."

"Cleaner?" The Doctor scoffed, looking horribly offended. "I could take you back home right now." His grin at the end was what gave away that he wasn't serious, and as much as he'd tried to cover it up, Wilf caught it.

"Don't think your missus would like that." He said.

"No, she wouldn't." The Doctor said with a half cringe, looking all the world like that would be the worst idea. Worse than, say, going after someone who sounded like a right nutter. An alien nutter, likely.

"Doctor," he said after a moment. He thought that maybe he should tell him about the dreams, about the laughing man that reminded him a bit too much of that Prime Minister that only lasted a few days a couple years back. The Doctor looked up from what ever he was doing, looking at Wilf expectantly. "Nothing." He said, putting on a smile. "It's just an honor, being here, seeing all this." He said, gesturing around the console room. "Even if it isn't clean."

The Doctor grinned, wide and honest, and it gave body to the one Wilf forced on. The Doctor strode toward him, hand extended for a shake Wilf gladly took.

"Welcome aboard."

* * *

 

Time ticked away. The slow path. The daunting path. One where Donna's mother pointedly ignored Rose, and she in turn did her best to stay out of the way and watch over Donna as requested. She glanced at the clock, knowing without time sense exactly how much time had passed since the Doctor took Wilf with him to the TARDIS.

1 hour, 42 minutes, 54 seconds. 55, 56, 57….

"I'm sure Granddad will be fine." She heard Donna try to reason with her mother. "I'm fine. I'd have still been with 'im if it hadn't been for those bloody things Lance tried to kill me with. Gave me a right headache. Sorta getting one now just thinking of it."

1 hour, 44 minutes, 13 seconds. 14, 15, 16 ….

"Seriously, though. Reminds me a bit of what happened right before the wedding. Or was it after. Rose, do you remember when that really bad headache started? The one that made the Doctor run those tests?"

"Not sure." Sure replied, because she had no idea what memories the Meta Crisis formed in Donna's head before he gave way.

1 hour, 45 minutes, 57 seconds. 58, 59 ….

A cup broke in the kitchen. "Mum, Shawn? What's happening? Rose?"

She darted up from her spot on the couch and ran to the kitchen. Donna was backed into the corner of the counter, Sylvia and Shawn having some sort of convulsion that only seemed to be affecting their heads. Whipping side to side so fast that they couldn't be seen.

Donna slowly reached into her pocket, pulling out her phone.

"Doctor!" Rose mentally screamed, reaching and clawing for their connection. "What is happening?" She demanded to know, hoping he would at least allow himself to hear and reply to her while he seemed to bloke any and all of his emotions.

Rose blinked, then had to close her eyes and lean back against the counter as the panicked, angry rush came over her before she could almost see what he did.

"The human race was always your favorite, Doctor." The Master said as he walked in front of her mate. "But there is no human race. There is only the Master race."

She opened her eyes and there before her was the Master. Two of them, wearing Sylvia and Shawn's clothes, and Donna clutching her head in agony.

"Keep Donna safe." The Doctor said to her, brushing her mind in a loving caresses before closing himself off from her so tightly she could barely feel his mental hum. He hadn't don this in decades, closed himself off like this. It had been after Carmen had told him of his pending death. When they returned from the planet, and were once more on the TARDIS, she had momentarily thought it had been about Christina. But she'd been with him long enough, knew him too well, and figured out that maybe he was simply not ready to go. Didn't want to change bodies, feared being one closer to his final regeneration.

And if he was dealing with the Master, and this is what cropped up ….

It had been a very long time since the wolf side of her made an appearance, but that didn't mean it was weak.

She lunged at the one in Sylvia's clothes, over powering it and slamming it's head hard against the counter top, only half hoping she hadn't hurt Sylvia in the process. She lunged at the one who had been Shawn, and he caught her wrists. So she head butted him, hard, hearing his nose crack before she kicked him in groin. Just as he looked up at her, eyes filled with rage, she hit him in a pressure point and he collapsed on the floor.

She turned to Donna, finding her slumped on the floor, passed out. Snatching the cell phone from the floor, she was partly relieved to see she was breathing.

And she'd only made it part way through dialing Wilf's number before she passed out.

Selecting Wilf's name from the list, Rose hit the call button before moving to the back door and locking it.

It rang nearly half a dozen times before it stopped mid ring.

"And who are you?" The Master's smooth voice asked, confusion and intrigue all mixed together.

It gave Rose pause as she moved to the front door.

"What have you done with the Doctor?" She countered, sensing his own pause on the other end.

"You're still alive." He said in disbelief.

"Last I checked," Rose said as she flipped the lock on the front door, peeking out the windows to see the streets empty.

"And still you. Miss Smith." The Master purred and taunted.

At that, Rose smirked. "That's Missus Smith, thank you."

"Oh, ho, ho, he married a human. How so very You." She knew he was talking to the Doctor, but couldn't hear any response.

"May I speak to my husband?" She asked calmly.

"He's a little … tied up at the moment." He said, and she heard the sound of something ripping, and a grunt from the Doctor in the background.

"That's better," She heard the Doctor in the background. "Hello. But honestly, do you really think I'd leave my best friend without any defense? And Rose, well, she's my bestest-best friend, or what have you. She's the best defense there is. And don't worry, Sweet Heart," He seemed to yell out. "Your Best mates will be fine, too."

"Oh, Sweetheart, how sweet." The Master said, his voice sounding nearly sickened by the term of endearment. "I wonder though, Sweetheart, who your best mates are? The freak, I know. He can't die, hardly makes him human. Kinda like … oh! Oh, well, isn't that just a revelation! You aren't human, are you? What freaky things did our dear old Doctor do to you, huh?" He said it in a leering way that made Rose snarl.

"Take a guess, Koschei." She said, finding the name odd on her tongue. Not like the name of her husband, any of his names, no matter how alien. It felt oddly wrong, and yet strangely right like calling a close friend by their full name while having only really known them by the abbreviation or nickname.

"Let's make a deal then, shall we? I'll leave you and the Doctor's 'best mate' alone, and you stay out of all this."

"Never knew you to be one to make deals."

"I sense you'll be quite counter productive to anything I have planned. Until I need to deal with you, I'd prefer not to."

"I think that could be a suitable arrangement," Rose said as she noted a few people coming out of their homes, moving to the end of their driveways. It was obvious everyone had been converted, except for a handful of people. "Just be warned, when that time comes I will not make things easy for you."

"Hard to get and likes it rough." The Master said. "Wish I'd met you before he did." The call disconnected, and Rose went back to the kitchen to get Donna and make her more comfortable.

* * *

 

"She must have been special." The Master said as he hung up on Rose, and the Doctor started to wish that maybe he hadn't shut himself off so much from her.

He wanted to know what she did, feel what she felt, let her know what was going on through his mind. He knew it was for the best, because if they got caught up in conversation, the Master would notice. And if he did, the Doctor didn't know what he might have done to Rose's mind when he got to her.

"She is." The Doctor amended, and the Master smirked, head moving in silent chuckle.

"Where's your TARDIS?" He asked the Doctor in a near casual way.

It reminded him so much of when they were boys, their earlier conversation still moving around in the forefront of the Doctor's mind. Those memories of being kids together, of being friends long before what ever consumed the Master took place. Even after that, because it's not like it happened right away. At least not until they were out of the Academy.

But it had been so long, so very, very long that the Doctor no longer remembered when his first and oldest friend had changed so much.

"You could be so wonderful." He said thoughtfully.

"Where is it." The Master insisted.

But the Doctor couldn't let it go. "You're a genius. You're stone-cold brilliant. You are, I swear, you really are. But you could be so much more. You could be beautiful." He noted that the Master didn't seem so cocky or arrogant at the moment, so he continued. "With a mind like that, we could travel the stars."

"The three of us? Happy family, me, you, and your mate?" He said with a half hearted taunt.

"It would be our honor." The Doctor said honestly. "'Cause you don't need to own the universe, just see it. To have the privilege of seeing the whole of time and space. That's ownership enough."

"Would it stop, then?" The Master asked. "The noise in my head?"

"I can help." He would, too. He wasn't sure how, but he would.

"I don't know what I'd be without that noise." The Master admitted, and it made the Doctor's hearts ache to see the truth behind that.

"Wonder what I'd be without you," he countered, and it didn't have to be said why. Memories of those days when it was just the two of them because there was no one else had been dredged up enough.

Master sniffled, a light smile pulling on his lips. "Yeah."

"What does he mean?" Wilf asked from where he was tied up opposite of the Doctor. "What noise?"

The Master's moment of contentment vanished, and he turned to Wilf and told him the story.

"I looked into time, old man, and I heard it calling to me," He concluded his tale of the untempered schism. "The never ending drums. Listen to it." He said, turning to the Doctor from where he sat in the grand desk chair. "Listen."

"Then let's find it, you and me." The Doctor offered. At this moment of utter calm, at the possibility of seeing his once best friend emerge from this Time Lord once again, he left his wife out of it. He thought of Rose, she was there in his mind along with the very dampened feel of her, but she was there. He knew the rules still applied that were set so long ago, but was the Master really a companion?

"Except," The Master stood, breaking the Doctor out of his musings. He watched as he came around the desk slowly, realization dawning over his features. "Oh! Oh, wait a minute. Oh yes. Oh, that's good." He turned back to the Doctor, his smile growing. "The noise exists within my head, and now within six billion heads. Everyone on Earth can hear it. Imagine! Oh … oh, yes!" He laughed, and the Doctor watched as the Master's life force flickered, caught the horrified look on Wilf's face when the Master's skull was reveal for a moment. The Master dropped, clutching at his once more fleshed covered head.

"The gate wasn't enough." The Doctor said regretfully. "You're still dying."

"This body was born out of death," The Master retorted as he got to his feet. "All it can do is die. But what did you say to me, back in the wasteland? You said 'the end of time'."

"I said something is returning." The Doctor corrected. "I was shown a prophecy, that's why I need your help."

"You don't need me. You have a companion until that mate of yours fades away. All you're being right now is a sentimental fool where I," The Master laughed, hands out away from his sides. "What if I'm part of the prophecy? The drumbeat is calling from so far away, from the end of time itself. And now it's been amplified six billion times. Triangulate all those signals, I could find the source." He strode slowly toward him. "Oh, Doctor, that's what your prophecy was: me." The Master slapped him, but he didn't flinch. "Where's the TARDIS."

"Just stop, think." The Doctor asked of him.

The Master looked a solider who still wore his helmet. "Kill him," he said, gesturing to Wilf. "I need that technology, Doctor. Tell me where it is, or the old man is dead." He put his cards on the table, and as he moved to stand at the side of the soldier who pointed the gun at Wilf who vehemently asked the Doctor to not say a word. "I'll kill him right now." The Master warned once more.

And the Doctor barely stopped the smirk. "Actually, the most impressive thing about you is that after all this time, you're still bone-dead stupid." He taunted his friend, watching the confusion come over the Master before he replaced it with frustration. "You've got six billion pairs of eyes, but you still can't see the obvious, can you?"

"Like what?" The Master huffed.

"That guard is one inch too tall." The Doctor said, maybe just a little too smug considering he was still strapped down.

The Master turned in time to be hit with the butt of the rifle,knocking him out.

The Solider took of his helmet, revealing himself to be Rossiter, the Vinvocci man whom the Doctor stripped of his shimmer and revealed as alien to the humans.

"Oh my god, I hit him!" Rossiter said, looking down at the limp body of the Master at his feet. "I've never his anyone in my life.

Addams, Rossiter's partner, ran into the room and worked to untie Wilf. "Well, come on." She growled at Rossiter. "We need to get out of here, fast."

"God bless the cactuses!" Wilf cried with joy as Addams worked on his bindings.

"That's Cacti," The Doctor corrected.

"That's racist." Rossiter said, and all the Doctor could do for the moment was snicker.

* * *

 

She peered out the window again, noting the Masters were still standing in wait, none having moved from where they stopped when she and the original came to an agreement all so long ago. Rose moved to kneel beside Donna, brushing hair from her forehead in an effort to get an idea as to whether or not her mind was burning. Donna's steady breathing was a good sign, and the fact that those who used to be Sylvia and Shawn were currently locked in the shed out back eased Rose's worry that maybe she'd wake up only to fall into agony once more.

With a huff, Rose plopped on the floor and hugged her knees. Her body was tense with the need to fight, knowing her husband was in trouble, having felt his mind drift further away from her not that long ago. She had to protect Donna, she understood that. It was more important for her to be here and ensure she didn't burn from the inside than to confront the Master when she knew the Doctor could likely handle him better.

She dug the heel of her hands in her eyes. The Doctor was really the only person she had to worry about. He implied that Jack was going to be immune to the problem at hand, though she wondered if the Doctor considered Mickey's presence on this Earth once again. Likely not. He was thinking of Tim, she was sure. He probably wanted to remind her that they'd taken Tim off world to spend some time with Jenny at their daughter's request. A small adventure for their friend in celebration of him getting his first novel picked up by a small publisher with Jenny as his guide to the alien world she wanted him to see.

Did the Master know about her? Likely not, and it was better that he didn't. But the Doctor, she knew from the stories he would tell, often had a hard time separating the man who was once his friend from the one who now wanted to destroy him. One well played emotion of sentiment from the Master, and the Doctor may try and see the good, beg his friend back.

"His greatest strength is also his greatest weakness," The Woman's voice startled Rose, shot her head up to see the white dressed lady standing before her. "His hearts."

"That it is." Rose said, meeting the woman's brown eyes. Eyes like her husband's, ancient and all knowing, warm and full of deep sadness. "He's about to do something reckless, isn't he?" She asked the woman point blank.

"In order to save the world? Yes." She nodded once. "They are returning."

"Who?" Rose asked.

"Those who should never know of you, Bad Wolf. You are special, you created yourself for him. Keep hidden, and know there is a chance you may both make it through this day yet."

"Will I see you again?" She asked the woman.

"No." She replied bluntly.

"Then I want to say thank you." Rose said sincerely.

"For?"

"Him." She said simply, and the woman smiled.

Rose blinked, and she was gone.

She closed her eyes, resting her forehead against her knees, focusing on ticking of the clock in the living room, the only sound among the silence. She didn't count the seconds, knew it was past that point, and simply tried not to think at all except the odd thought of her daughter, friends, or mate.

"Rose," The Doctor's voice and presence caressed her mind, and she gasped at the Maelstrom of emotions that bled through. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so, sorry, but …."

And then he shared with her everything. How she was right about him trying once again to gain his friend back. How he noted the alien in hiding.

"Worst … rescue … ever!" He showed her their escape. The teleport. Making the ship go dark so the aliens couldn't run from the situation.

"You don't want to listen to an old man's tales, do you?"

"I'm older than you," The Doctor had told Wilf as they had their moment.

Wilf chuckled. "Suppose, but can't be by much. Your wife is, what, a hundred something? Can't be much older than that."

"I'm 1006."

"What? Can't be that big of an age gap between you two. You look so young. Really, though?"

"Yeah."

"900 years," Wilf had said, "We must look like insects to you."

"I think you look like giants."

She'd seen their exchange about the gun Wilf smuggled out, the Doctor pointing out how Wilf didn't use it.

"I'd be proud." The Doctor had told him.

"Of what?"

"If you were my dad."

Her eyes prickled with tears at seeing such an honest, raw moment. The Noble family was going to be tied to them forever, seared into their hearts for the rest of time as an extended family, and she couldn't be happier about it.

But the joy and warmth faded fast as she glimpsed the Master's broadcast. She didn't get what a white point star was, but she understood why it was dangerous. She could feel the fear and worry rising as she sensed the Doctor's fear for Earth.

Fear over the Time Lord's returning.

"I'm sorry, Rose." He said again. "I'm so, so sorry. But I need to stop them. Need to figure out a way. And I … we … that's to say."

"I love you," She said with his name, sending him all the proof she could. "And all this? I wouldn't have missed it for the world. So go save it, and make sure there's a place for Jenny to bring Tim back to."

He sent her love back, so much it broke her heart as he closed off their bond again. She felt him stronger and stronger against her mind, like he was returning to Earth.

Pain crashed over her enough that she screamed out, feeling almost like every single bone in her body was breaking. It was the Doctor, what ever happened, he lost control over sealing their bond for a split moment, and all the pain he felt hit her before it disappeared after no more than a couple seconds.

She attempted to catch her breath as she panted like she'd done something more than sit on the floor. Hands in her hair, she closed her eyes and concentrated all she could on those she and the Doctor would be leaving behind if this would be the end.

Emergency program two would take the TARDIS to wherever she was in time and space. The doors would open, and when she stepped inside the message the two of them recorded together would play for their daughter. It would give their final goodbyes, remind her that they loved her, and the TARDIS would become hers as she was almost as bonded with it as they were.

She tried to remember that the end couldn't be so close, not with so many moments still left to happen, that time being rewritten at this point would cause reaper-bringing paradoxes. But if the world ended, then that wouldn't matter.

The Earth rumbled like an Earth quake, and the sunshine outside was replaced with a dark, red shadow. She stood, running outside and noting that those who had been the Master were back to themselves, staring up at the sky above. Rose craned her head, seeing a large red planet she'd never laid eyes on before over eclipsing the sun.

She moved backward a few steps before running to where she'd locked Sylvia and Shawn, hearing them pound on the shed door. Rose gripped the pad lock, giving it a tug and taking the hinge right off the structure with bruising force.

Sylvia stepped out. "Where's Donna?" She asked desperately.

"Safe inside, where you two should be. Now move." She ordered, pushing both of them toward the house before looking up at the sky.

"Always wanted to see your planet, Love." She said to herself. "Didn't think I ever would. Especially not like this." She watched it for a moment, sensed it coming closer, causing her fight instinct to prickle wildly as her flight instinct begged to be heard.

She went back inside to make sure Donna stayed sleeping, knowing now there was nothing more for her to do. The fate of the world, perhaps more, was in the Doctor's hands and his alone.

For the first time in over a century, she was helpless.

* * *

 

It had to be her, didn't it? She had to be one of the dissenters standing behind bloody Rassilon. The moment he met her tear filled eyes, he felt shame. Because he was better than this: a man holding a gun, wondering which Time Lord he should kill. She knew that, too. She was the reason he was better than this. And she made him wonder what his wife would have thought if she saw him like this. He remembered what she'd been like when he threatened to kill the last Dalek, but that had been so long ago. Not like it mattered, he knew. No matter how much either of them changed, when it came down to it, she'd still be puzzled by his actions.

He held the eye of the only woman in the Universe aside from Rose that could remind him who he was with just a look, and watched as she shifted her gaze to something. Something behind him, the Master? No, the … oh. Oh, yes! That's how this would work.

He turned around, met the Master's sad but understanding gaze. "Get out of the way." He said firmly, and that sadness vanished from the Master before he dived out of the way just as the Doctor pulled the trigger, breaking the link created through the white point star, smiling to himself as he watched it go up in flames.

"The link if broken," He said as he turned to face the Time Lords. "Back into the Time War, Rassilon. Back into hell."

"You will die with me, Doctor." Rassilon sneered, raising his gauntlet covered hand.

"I know." He accepted, thinking of Rose as Rassilon pointed the gauntlet at him. I'm sorry. He thought again, feeling no need to send it to her after already apologizing so much. It would be better if she didn't know it was coming, so she wouldn't be scared.

"Get out of the way," He heard the Master repeat his words, and the Doctor obeyed without thought.

He watched as the Master used his life force to shoot energy at Rassilon, striking him in the chest and causing him to stagger backward.

"You did this to me!" The Master raged. "All of my life, you made me." He continued to fire from one hand then the next. "One, two, three, four." It became a blur, a whirl wind, with white light blinding him. At some point, he felt himself lose his footing, his back colliding with the floor covered in broken glass from where he came through the dome.

And then it was over.

The Doctor groaned as he rolled on to his side. "I'm alive." He said when he realized how much pain he was in, the hum of Rose's quieted mind against his. "I'm alive," he said with a bit of a laugh this time, sitting up.

He heard four knocks.

Really, he should have known it wouldn't have been the Master. It was too obvious. Tim, Carmen, the Ood, the all said four knocks, not four beats. The Doctor turned his head, and there was Wilf standing in one of the two radiation chambers, waving innocently.

The Doctor could hear the hum of the nuclear bolt left open by the Master, knew what would happen if he didn't let Wilf out. Knowing what would happen if he did.

"Rose." He said out loud as well as through their bond.

"Yes," She said back, her voice and echo in his head.

He closed his eyes. "Our life for someone else's?"

"Always." She said without question, and his lips twitched with a smirk.

He didn't close his bond off, not yet. He wanted to be enveloped in her love and affection for as long as he could.

He walked into the other booth without preamble. Maybe it was her bravery fueling him, because he was sure that without it he wouldn't be so calm.

He looked to Wilf on the other side of the glass that separated them. "One touch of the controls, and this half floods." He told Wilf, the young man's eyes going wide in his old looking face. "I'll absorb it all, and you'll walk away, right as rain." The Doctor laughed. "And I will never know if I'll say that phrase again."

"What do you mean?" Wilf asked.

"I'll change, with luck. I'll be a different man when this is over." He took a deep breath, understanding the Wilf wouldn't. "I'll die."

"No, no, no, please don't." Wilf shook is head. "Just leave me. I'm an old man, Doctor, I've had my time." He tried to sway the Time Lord, but he only smiled. He sent love back to Rose, his wife and partner for so very long, and then closed off the bond.

"Wilfred, it's my honor." He pressed the button, and the burning pain overwhelmed him. He collapsed against the floor, clutching at himself, feeling the urge to vomit but knowing his body wouldn't let him.

It passed as the humming of the machine died off.

"Hello?" Wilfred asked in a shaky voice.

"Hi," The Doctor choked out..

"Still with us?"

"For now." The Doctor said, putting his hand on the door to steady himself only to have it give way. "Oh, now it opens." He used the control panel to pull himself up, then stepped out, feeling unsteady on his feet.

"There then," Said Wilf, a forced grin looking too fake with his worried eyes. "Safe and sound. Mind you, you're in a hell of a state. You've got some battle scars there." He said, gesturing to the Doctor's face.

He reached up and touched the cuts as he felt the hot heat of change begin to simmer below the surface. He pushed it back.

It wasn't time.

There were people he had to see first.

Things needed to be said.

A wife he needed with him just in case.


	36. Au Revoir, Allons-y

Rose turned away from the awake Donna as she heard the TARDIS materialize outside. She still didn't feel the Doctor in her head, and she feared what she'd find as she bolted from the house and to the time ship. The TARDIS was humming a lament, which only fueled Rose's fears further.

Snapping her fingers, she ran inside, finding the Doctor leaning against the console with a weak smile.

She smiled at first, then caught the faint golden glow beneath his skin.

"I'm going to drop you off to the day of Donna's wedding." He said as he worked some controls. "One of us should be there."

"Doctor." She said, moving closer to him, hesitating as she remembered how he wanted her to stay back the last time he regenerated.

He took her hand. "I have a few places I want to go first." He told her honestly. "But I will be there to see Donna when I can. I promise."

She nodded, grabbing his head and kissing him firmly, running her fingers through his hair the way he liked, caressing his sideburns before she trailed over his face, memorizing it as he flipped the switch and sent them on their way.

She let the tears slide down her cheeks, but refused to cry over this too much.

Same man, different body.

She knew the drill.

She just knew how much she'd miss him. Just like she missed his ninth self. Just like there were times she wished she had longer in their dream reality with his eighth body.

The TARDIS landed, but she wasn't quite ready to let go.

"I'll be back," he promised, cupping her cheek before taking a step back, gesturing to the door for her to go.

She nodded, heading for the doors, stepping outside with one last look over her shoulder.

The Noble house was already teaming with activity, and she heard Donna running toward her with the giddiness of a teenager long before she saw the bride running down the walkway. And for her friend's benefit, she would plaster on a smile and pretend that these might not be the last few hours of her life.

* * *

 

"This has been great, really," Tim assured Jenny for the dozenth time as they walked toward the newly materialized TARDIS, landing exactly when and where it was supposed to.

"Good," Jenny said with a nervous grin that he thought was really cute but would never admit to.

He was glad they expanded on their friendship, that their kiss in the TARDIS a year ago (for him, anyway) had never been brought up again. Though, now that they were essentially the same age, it seemed less weird to him to think about.

Jenny snapped her fingers, and the TARDIS doors opened. He waved her in first, setting down both their bags at the foot of the ramp when he stepped inside. He was raised as a gentleman, after all. And even if the lady in question was an alien with more strength than he had he wasn't about to let her carry her own backpack. It may have been light as a feather thanks to its trandimensional interior, but that didn't make a bit of difference.

"Hey, Doc. Wolf…." He stopped as he caught sight of only the Doctor standing at the console, leaning heavily against it. He swallowed, remembering what he saw a few months back. "She's not here."

"Donna's getting married." The Doctor replied. "She's one of the bride's maids, or something like that."

"Oh, yay!" Jenny said, hopping and clapping a bit. "Can we go?"

"No, Love." The Doctor said as she sent them on their way through the Vortex. "I'm afraid we can't."

The TARDIS landed with a shudder, and Jenny looked confused. "Why not?"

The Doctor glanced at Tim, then stepped up to his daughter, brushing her hair behind her ear. "I'm dying." He said.

"What?" Jenny stuttered.

"This me is dying. I'm going to … when you see me again, I won't look like this anymore. You'll know me, up here." He said, tapping Jenny's temple. "But you won't recognize me at first look."

"You're regenerating." She said, understanding.

Tim expected her to lash out, probably getting that he must of have known it was going to happen. But Jenny didn't.

"I've brought you back to school," The Doctor said. "I've a feeling River will be able to help you through this."

"You won't stay?" She asked. He shook his head. "Why not?"

"Because I need to get Tim home, and then I need to return to your mother." He explained calmly, a flash of gold dancing along his skin. "And I'm running out of time."

Jenny nodded, then threw her arms around her Dad's neck. "I love you, Dad." She said, her words muffled.

"Love you too," He said, kissing her forehead.

Jenny turned away, moving quickly from the TARDIS, grabbing her bag. "Hear from you soon?" She said to Tim as she was half way out the door.

"Sure will, Goldie Locks." He smiled as best he could at her, earning a small, genuine one in return, and then she was gone. The TARDIS took off. "I'm sorry." He said without looking at the Doctor.

"Don't be." He said with a sigh. "You weren't the only one who warned me."

Tim nodded, the TARDIS landing with a shudder. He walked to the ramp, picked up his bag, turned to the Doctor. "See you later, Stormboy." He said casually, not wanting the Doctor to know how sad he really was that the face he knew, the one who saved him in numerous ways, would never be seen by his eyes again.

"Bye, Tim." The Doctor said, and Tim nodded before he stepped outside the TARDIS.

Into a foot of snow.

"Fuck," he said, laughing a bit at how he was going to explain to his Aunt who he told he'd be gone for a week why he was actually gone for, what he would guess, was four or five months.

* * *

 

Rose had stood and smiled for pictures in her gold-toned dress, playing giddy and happy when needed while she knew her husband was dying. Changing. Maybe without her.

Donna would catch the odd wistful look, knowing without fully comprehending what was happening. She knew he'd have a different face when she saw him again, having learned about regeneration before the meta crisis and the knowledge not needing too much filtering. It was alien, of course, but when they discussed it it was like she equated it to a face lift. What ever worked to keep her in their lives.

When the TARDIS groaned out from around the corner of the church, Rose turned to Donna who smiled as she fiddled with one of Rose's curls in a motherly gesture. "Go to him." She said, her attention being quickly pulled away by Shawn.

She handed Nerys her bouquet, picking up the skirt of her dress as she darted away.

Rose found the Doctor leaning against the church wall, face twisted in pain as he clutched at himself.

"You need to get inside the TARDIS." She lectured.

"One last thing," He groaned, reaching into his pocket and pulling out an envelope. He moved to take a step and nearly fell over. "Might need help." He chuckled weakly.

She ducked to loop his arm over her shoulder, guiding him around the corner where they found Wilf and Sylvia coming to investigate.

"And here you are, same old face." Wilf said after the initial surprise. "Didn't I tell you you'd be alright?" He said, smile wavering as he met Rose's eye and she gave him a subtle head shake. Wilf nodded, looking back to the Doctor. "They've arrested Mister Naismith. Crime's undisclosed. And his daughter, too, the both of 'em." He paused. "But there's one thing you never told me, Doctor, and I keep wondering: That woman. Who was she?"

Rose looked up at the Doctor, curious if he would tell Wilf the truth, if he'd ever know that she visited her as well. She hoped, saw that he might say, then his muscles tensed around her.

"Can you give this to Donna?" He asked as he handed the envelope to Sylvia. "Wedding present. Thing is, Rose is the one who carries the money, and she's been here so I popped back in time and borrowed a quid off a really lovely man. Geoffry Noble. 'Have it', he said." The Doctor explained, and Sylvia's reaction made Rose's heart swell. "She can have a good life, the best one she can have on Earth. They can travel the world, and never have to work another day in their lives."

"From a quid?" Wilf asked.

The Doctor smirked. "Time Traveler can do a lot with a quid." He said just before Donna shouted about a tight schedule.

Sylvia looked to Rose expectantly.

"She knows I won't be back today." She said. "But go, we'll see her again."

Sylvia nodded, turning and pulling a still confused Wilf along with her.

The second they were gone, the Doctor tensed and his weight became nearly too much for Rose to hold up. "Come on," She said, wrapping her arm around him to better help him along back toward the TARDIS. The Doctor leaned heavily on Rose, whimpering and sweating. "Almost there," She soothed, feeling him grow warmer by the second. "Just hold on," She said as she lifted on hand, snapping her fingers, the doors opening instantly. As they stepped inside, the Old Girl whimpered in her mind, sharing the pain of her Time Lord.

The Doctor panted heavily as she half lugged him to the jumpseat, sitting him down before running about the console and getting them into the Vortex.

"Rose," He said, his voice hoarse with pain, and she went to move to him. "No, stay there." He warned suddenly, wincing. "It's not going to be like last time, it's going to be much bigger. Held off too long."

"Why?" She asked, tears coming to her eyes.

He smiled, "Had things to do, people to warn." He said. "I just wish I could have included you in those final goodbyes. Give you a proper one. One suited for the life we've shared."

"You can make up for it in the next one." She tried to joke, her voice catching.

"Quite right, too." He chuckled, wincing. "Oh this is not how I wanted to go. Not at all." He panted. "And I suppose, if it's the last chance for you to hear it from this body, in this voice. Rose Tyler," He grunted. Bending over, he clutched the edge of the console and pulled him self to his feet. It looked like it took monumental effort, his face twisted in agony. "Rose Tyler," He tried again, looking up at her just as his skin began to take on the hot, golden glow. "I love you." He got out just before the energy exploded around him.

It was so intense, Rose felt it lick her skin, the burn of energy causing her to hiss. The TARDIS whimpered, then cried, and Rose noticed the coral struts catching fire. After seeing the destruction taking hold of their beloved ship, Rose turned to the Doctor.

And couldn't help but smile.

Because she knew the man that started to come through.

* * *

 

The hot pain of regeneration ended abruptly, and the Doctor emerged from the heat feeling new. Well, that would make sense, wouldn't it? Everything about him was changed. Wait, he was still a him, yes? He wasn't about to make his wonderful wife turn teams, was he? Yes, still a he, still definitely a he. And if the Adam's apple in his neck wasn't tip-off enough, the familiar twitch in his trousers as he caught sight of Rose in that dress a few feet away did the trick.

"Two arms, two legs, and still a man!" He exclaimed, arms out to the side as he showed her him. "So, Rose Tyler, what do you think? Am I fit? Dashing? An upgrade over the previous model?"

She smiled that wonderful smile, with her tongue sticking out between her teeth. It made him grin. Different this grin, not quite as manic, didn't pull as wide. And the teeth, his teeth were different again.

"Well, Sweetheart?" He asked taking a couple steps toward her. She met his eye, but something was different there. "Rose?" he asked, worry coming through and he started wringing his hands.

Her eyes rolled back, and while he fell on his arse in the process he managed to dive down and catch her before she hit the grating.

"Rose!" He screamed out in panic.

He died. He technically died, and she was over a hundred years old. She didn't age, she didn't change, but what if … what if he held the body of his wife who died at a hundred twenty-seven because the man she bonded with had died as well.

Hands shaking, he checked for a pulse, but when he couldn't steady himself enough he remembered he'd raised his shields to stop her from feeling his pain. Lowering them quickly, the Doctor felt his wife's mental signature still humming strongly.

"Good, good, that's good." He said, just noting the TARDIS's panic and pain now that his mate was no longer his greatest concern. "Not so good if I don't get us landed properly. Crashing, yes, let's not do this. Not today. Alright, hang on there, Sweetheart. Gonna be a bumpy ride." He said as he grabbed hold of a lever. "Geronimo!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will start posting the next installment, "Until the End", very soon!


End file.
